- Referee Kelly Pfeifer had to change his shoes after ‘blowing out’ one
- Backup official Adam Flore wore the same size and loaned Pfeifer his own pair
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A March Madness referee suffered a wardrobe malfunction during the NCAA tournament game between Akron and Creighton.
Kelly Pfeifer, who officiated Thursday’s match, had to change his shoes after ‘blowing out’ one.
Luckily for Pfeifer, backup official Adam Flore reportedly wore the same size and lent him his pair so the referee could continue with the game in Pittsburgh.
Initially, Pfeifer asked to swap just one shoe, but because the two officials were wearing conflicting brands, he had to borrow Flore’s pair.
On the air, Pfeifer went to the sideline, where he completed the shoe swap with the backup.
NCAA referee Kelly Pfeifer suffered a wardrobe malfunction when his sneaker blew out
Backup official Adam Flore wore the same size and lent Pfeifer his own pair of sneakers
The incident came with 6:45 left in the second half of Akron vs Creighton
The incident came with 6:45 left in the second half of Akron vs Creighton.
No. No. 3 Creighton went on to win the first-round clash, defeating the No. 14 Zips 77-60.
Zion Williamson suffered from a similar problem when he was a star at Duke University in February 2019.
Williamson’s shoe tore less than a minute into the 2019 game against the University of North Carolina, causing the player to fall and injure his knee, keeping him out of the rest of the game.
UNC went on to win 88-72 and Nike stock took a hit, falling one percent the next morning.
‘We are of course concerned and would like to wish Zion a speedy recovery. The quality and performance of our products are of the utmost importance,” Nike said in a statement at the time.
“While this is an isolated incident, we are working to identify the problem.”