On SuperBowl Sunday this year, a seemingly never before seen phenomenon happened. On the biggest stage in sports, it went dark. The lights went out in the Superdome in New Orleans. The game was stopped for 30+ minutes. The commentators just filled the time with repeating stats and analysis of the game. Much of which they had just talked about at halftime. Players stretched and sat around shooting the breeze. We even saw one player for the 49ers yawning. Maybe that’s whey they lost. Anyway, this wasn’t the first time a major televised event had technical lighting difficulties. On today February 28th, 1940 in a game featuring the Fordham Rams vs Pitt Panthers the lights also went out. This was the first televised basketball game. The lights at Madison Square Garden went dark for only 20 minutes. Its amazing that it only took the guys at the garden 20 minutes to get the lights back on way back in 1940 while it took the guys at the Superdome more than 30 minutes. This puts the two events on the same plane. Although the Super Bowl has multi million dollar ads, a huge spectacle and several multi million dollar athletes and in 1940 it was on a much smaller scale they are joined by one singular element. The blackout. Its not new and the superbowl will not be the last we have seen of it. Lights dont matter to me, I could drop a jumper at midnight, outside, blindfolded in a rainstorm.