5 Amazing College Sports Pranks

April Fool’s Day is fast approaching and we want to school you in the best college pranks of all time. These classic cons and cunning schemes span 115 years and run the gamut from feats of engineering genius to acts of derring-do involving speeding locomotives. We think you’ll agree that they all deserve an A+ for ingenuity.

5. Suck it Up

Yale has long considered itself superior to Harvard, and for one day at least they proved it. Back on November 20, 2004 a group of Yale pranksters snuck into the Harvard alumni section of the school’s annual Harvard-Yale football game disguised as members of the school’s pep squad. They proceeded to hand out crimson and white placards that they assured fans would spell out “GO HARVARD” when held aloft.

The fans fell for it hook, line, and sinker, and when the appropriate moment came they flipped the cards and proudly held them high above their heads. Rather than spelling out “GO HARVARD”, as promised, the placards spelled out “WE SUCK” instead. Harvard fans were initially unaware that they had been duped and were convinced to hold their placards up a second time later in the game.

The prank received attention from media outlets around the world and continues to be a point of pride among Yalies.

4. Pete Carroll’s Arresting Performance

You’d be hard-pressed to find a more fun-loving coach than Pete Carroll, who’s famous for the many pranks he pulled on his players during his days at USC. Carroll’s most elaborate set-up took place on April 1, 2008 when he arranged to have police officers interrupt one of his film sessions and arrest defensive lineman Everson Griffen for “abusing a freshman.”

The officers handcuffed the 6’3”, 273 lb. Griffen and put a jacket over his head while Carroll showed his players a tape of the incident in question. Much to their relief, the footage was just of Griffen knocking down Trojans offensive lineman Matt Meyer during a drill.

Griffen was in on the joke all along and now, years later, still remembers it fondly. “It was funny,’’ said Griffen. “It was a good one. Those were the kind of things Coach Carroll did to just keep it fun.’’

3. Shattered Dreams

The Florida Gators broke numerous records during their championship season in 2006, so it’s only fitting that head coach Billy Donovan got to break something of his own. The three-time SEC Coach of the Year punk’d his players by “accidentally” dropping their oversized championship trophy at the team’s Midnight Madness event the following October.

What no one – not even Al Horford or Joakim Noah – knew at the time was that the trophy was a replica, and that the real Waterford crystal orb was safe and sound in Donovan’s office.

Ironically, Florida’s 2006 BCS football trophy was broken for real two years later when Orson Charles inadvertently knocked it over during a tour of the school.

Ironically, Florida’s 2006 BCS football trophy was broken for real two years later when highly-touted high school recruit Orson Charles inadvertently knocked it over during a tour of the school. Head coach Urban Meyer jokingly told him he had no choice but to commit and win them another one, but Charles spurned them for Georgia instead, and went on to earn All-SEC First Team honors in 2011.

2. Blow Me

The annual Harvard-Yale football game was the setting for another classic college prank on November 20, 1982, only this time around Yale had nothing to do with it. The mayhem occurred during the second quarter when a giant black balloon with “MIT” written on it emerged from beneath the turf on the 46-yard line and inflated to ten-feet in diameter before bursting with a deafening pop.

The prank was the brainchild of MIT’s Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, who spent weeks planning and preparing the stunt. They began by building a freon-driven hydraulic press with a vacuum cleaner motor to inflate the balloon. Next, they made eight trips to Harvard Stadium between the wee hours of 1:30 and 5:00 a.m. to install the device. Finally, they connected its wires to an isolated stadium circuit which controlled the irrigation system and covered it up with dirt and sod.

Harvard beat Yale 45-7, but the only thing anyone really remembers about the game was the big black balloon and the group of merry pranksters who made Harvard and Yale look like fools.

1. Wreck Tech

College sports pranks are far from a new phenomenon. Students at Auburn pulled off the grand daddy of them all back on November 7, 1896 when they greased the train tracks near the university with pig lard and soap to prevent the train containing the visiting George Tech football team from being able to stop. The rascally ruse worked beautifully and the Yellow Jackets were forced to walk nearly five miles back to town carrying all of their gear.

By the time they arrived, they were thoroughly exhausted and proceeded to get pasted 45-0 by the Tigers. Officials at both schools made sure it wouldn’t happen again, but Auburn students continued to commemorate the prank for many years with their Wreck Tech Pajama Parade, an annual walk to the train depot that culminated in a spirited pre-game pep rally.