DAVID AULICINO: We're headed up to Boston
checking out the stadium for the prank.
[MUSIC PLAYING]
A few years ago, I was at a math conference,
and I was sitting around in the table at dinner with a few other mathematicians.
And one of them went to Harvard and started
telling the story of this amazing prank that was against Harvard.
And, at that point, I felt I had to interrupt,
and said, well, actually I can tell you a lot more about that.
OK?
MIKE KAI: OK.
SPEAKER 1: The idea was perfected in a dorm room.
MIKE KAI: I came up with the idea actually
to prank them with signs at the football game.
We threw some ideas out there as far as what the signs would say.
We eventually settled on, "we suck."
DAVID AULICINO: And my immediate reaction was, no, this will never work.
However, the problem solver and me started thinking, well, maybe we
can make this work.
SPEAKER 1: The problem--
they had to infiltrate Harvard stadium without getting caught,
sneak in 1,800 placards, distribute them to unsuspecting Harvard fans,
and then convince those fans to prank themselves.
DAVID AULICINO: That's great.
MIKE KAI: We thought about basically every possible thing that
could go wrong and tried to come up with a solution for it.
DAVID AULICINO: And then you put two reds on top of it.
SPEAKER 1: They made fake Harvard IDs and fake back
stories, fake placard designs, and a 28 member fake pep squad.
SPEAKER 2: I can see the shirt.
SPEAKER 1: On November 20, 2004, the fake Harvard students
smuggled the placards into the game.
SPEAKER 3: What do you think of Yale, sir?
SPEAKER 4: They suck.
SPEAKER 5: It's not going to say something like Yale sucks, is it?
SPEAKER 6: It says go Harvard.
SPEAKER 1: But then trouble.
SPEAKER 7: What houses are you guys in?
That's not a real house.
SPEAKER 8: How many extra are there?
SPEAKER 9: Sometimes.
SPEAKER 10: Ho-fo.
SPEAKER 7: Yeah.
You guys aren't from Harvard, are you?
SPEAKER 11: Yo-fo!
DAVID AULICINO: I just showed in the front with this ID,
and, all of a sudden, he just ran away, and he felt so embarrassed.
SPEAKER 1: Having escaped one confrontation,
they couldn't risk another.
It was time.
MIKE KAI: This just looks like a total mess.
We have absolutely no idea if this is going to work.
DAVID AULICINO: Look at them!
They have the paper!
It's going to happen!
It's actually going to happen!
I can't [BLEEP] believe this!
SPEAKER 1: What was once a prank became a legend.
[CHEERING]
MIKE KAI: We [BLEEP] did it!
[BLEEP] did it!
And immediately we started hearing chants from the other side.
You suck.
[CHANTING "YOU SUCK"]
And I think it was at that point in time that we knew we had pulled it off.
SPEAKER 11: One more time!
Come on, Harvard!
There it goes again!
[CHEERING]
MIKE KAI: I really think it didn't matter
that Harvard won because of the prank.
For a lot of Yale students and alumni, we definitely won that year.
[MUSIC PLAYING]