A power outage at the Murphy Center at Middle Tennessee State University lasting more than two hours disrupted parts of the TSSAA volleyball state tournaments on Wednesday.
Some matches were moved to different locations in Murfreesboro, while others began more than five hours after their original starting times.
"They said five minutes, then 10 minutes, and two hours later we were still in the dark," said Whit Turnbow, an MTSU senior associate athletics director. "We had to do an all-hands-on-deck move and shift them next door. It's not easy to move an event of that size from an 11,000-seat arena to a 2,000-seat gymnasium.
"We had a bunch of people doing the best they could so teams, coaches and fans were being taken care of."
TSSAA officials with help from MTSU officials and volunteers turned Alumni Memorial Gym into the replacement site for most of the afternoon and evening.
"We see it as if they're our guests, and we want their experience to be one to remember," Turnbow said. "They certainly won't forget this one."
Baylor was not affected by the outage.
The Lady Red Raiders swept St. Agnes 3-0 by scores of 25-20, 25-15, and 25-12 while playing at Siegel High School. Baylor (44-4) advanced to the semifinals, where it is scheduled to face Briarcrest on MTSU court No. 1 at 12:30 p.m. today.
"We played really well," Baylor coach Sarah Lial said. "We served really well and served tough. We passed very well, which allowed us to open up our offense, and our hitters did a nice job of putting the ball away."
Signal Mountain won its first game of the day, 3-1 over Dyersburg by scores of 25-18, 25-12, 22-25, and 25-20. The Lady Eagles (34-19) were playing Knox Catholic late Wednesday night in a game that was originally scheduled for 5 p.m.
Also in Class AA, Hixson dropped a five-set match to Knox Catholic 28-26, 14-25, 22-25, 26-24 and 5-15. Hixson was on the court when the Murphy Center went dark. The Lady Wildcats later faced Dyersburg in an elimination match at Siegel High School.
In Class AAA, Ooltewah lost its opening match to Brentwood by scores of 25-9, 25-15 and 25-14. The Lady Owls were playing Houston in an elimination match late Wednesday.
Contact David Uchiyama at duchiyama@timesfreepress.com or at 423-757-6484. Follow him at Twitter.com/UchiyamaCTFP