A fake ref, a real fight and a wild night: Recalling the UA-UCLA prank and brawl

(This story was originally written in 2021)

"It’s unbelievable. … I can’t believe it’s already been a decade. Even after all this time, it’ll come up once in a while in Tucson, or a friend of a friend will recognize me and say, ‘Hey, aren’t you that guy that did this?’ It’s still pretty funny even after 10 years.”

That guy is Jacen Lankow, a University of Arizona graduate who is most famous for a prank he pulled during an 2011 game between the UA and UCLA at Arizona Stadium.

With four seconds left before halftime and the Wildcats leading 42-7, Lankow — a UA senior at the time — ran onto the field dressed as a game official, whistled a play dead, yelled “ball, ball, ball,” attempted to grab the football from the umpire — and then bolted from midfield to the north end zone while simultaneously ripping his costume off to reveal a Speedo. His Twitter handle — @WhoIsJacen — was written on his torso. Lankow crossed the goal line. When he tried to loop back, Lankow was tackled by a Pima County Sheriff’s deputy and escorted out by UAPD officers.

Then things really got weird: The Arizona and UCLA benches cleared and a fight broke out between players. It was unrelated to the prank.

“I just wanted to do something memorable for my senior year, mostly for myself and just to have a story to tell,” said Lankow, who spent the night in jail. “The more I thought about it, this idea came about and it sort of developed from there.”

A decade later, Lankow and a few UA players reflected on one of the most bizarre sequences to ever happen at Arizona Stadium:

The master plan

The Arizona-UCLA game was played Oct. 20, 2011. Lankow used the Halloween season as part of his plan; he visited different thrift stores across Tucson to find a referee costume and “tailored it as close to the real thing as possible.”

Lankow purchased a phony flip-phone (for reasons that will be revealed later) and counterfeited an all-access field pass using Microsoft Paint. Lankow hid his referee’s costume underneath a navy blue UA polo. He taped the legs of his black pants underneath his shorts.

Lankow then entered Arizona Stadium as a Zona Zoo member, perched himself away from the crowd, and thought about what he was about to do.

“I probably looked out of place, because everyone in Zona Zoo is close to the center and I was just sitting there in the back corner with my brother and my friend … with this focus on my face,” Lankow said. “I just kept thinking, ‘Am I actually going to do this?’ My friend Elizabeth was a little freaked out and said, ‘You don’t have to do this!’ I was like, ‘Nah, I do.’ What made me follow through with it is I made sure to tell as many people as I could beforehand, so I couldn’t chicken out.”

Lankow made his way toward the field during the second quarter of what was already a UA blowout. To prevent a verbal encounter, Lankow took the flip phone out of his shorts and pressed it to his ear.

“I walked by (security) and said, ‘Oh, I’ll come by and bring the Gatorade right now,’” he said.

It was almost too easy.

“I go down the ramp and once I’m on the field, I’m just stunned that I’ve made it this far and as I’m walking to the players, my friends sitting in the first row are going nuts and start cheering,” Lankow said. “They were probably drinking a little bit. I was really happy that I got onto the field, but at the same time I was like, ‘Guys, shut up; don’t get me caught here.’”

Lankow set up behind Arizona’s sideline and in front of the Zona Zoo. He stayed there for about 30 minutes, waiting for his moment.

‘Why is this bozo in a Speedo interrupting the game?’

The more Lankow waited, the more he questioned the timing of his stunt.

“It was about to be halftime and I didn’t know if I should do it in the second half and go with the players into the locker room, go with the trainers wherever they go or retreat to ZonaZoo,” he said.

Lankow didn’t want to run onto the field while the UA was on offense, because he didn’t want to disrupt any rhythm for the Wildcats. Wildcats quarterback Nick Foles was well on his way to a 291-yard passing performance. Wide receivers Gino Crump and Juron Criner finished with more than 100 yards.

Soon, Lankow’s moment appeared. UCLA had the ball with four seconds left before halftime. The Bruins then took a timeout.

Lankow got into costume behind Arizona’s bench, snaked his way through the players and coaches in front of him, and set foot on the field.

“I gathered my thoughts and had the courage to run out onto the field. It was pretty surreal and almost like an out-of-body experience,” Lankow said.

His shorts weren’t fully untaped when he ran onto the field, so his legs were revealed.

“I’ve seen a lot of the comments like, ‘I’ve never seen a ref wear capris,” he said. “That should’ve been the first tipoff.”

Lankow was escorted from the stadium moments later, his prank complete. A UAPD officer walked him past the mariachi performers and Folklorico dancers who were set to perform for National Hispanic Heritage Month.

“As I’m walking down the line of 50 people, I don’t think one person had a smile on their face,” Lankow said. “They’re just like, ‘Why is this bozo in a Speedo interrupting the game?’”

Lankow was initially hit with a felony charge for criminal impersonation. Two days later, it was reduced to misdemeanor trespassing.

Brawl before halftime

Seconds after Lankow was pummeled to the ground by a Pima County Sheriff’s deputy, Arizona Stadium erupted again. Arizona and UCLA players were fighting.

Former Arizona linebacker Jake Fischer, who was rehabbing an ACL injury at the time, “saw everyone running to my left.”

Said Fischer: “In the back of my mind, I’m like, ‘Oh, great. We’re going to have a fight and we’re gonna have suspensions.’ … Next thing I know, I see one of their reserve offensive linemen — and the guy is 6-6, 300 pounds — … starts running after me trying to hit me with a helmet. Next thing I know, one of their coaches tackles him.”

Arizona cornerback Shaq Richardson, a UCLA transfer, “most vividly remembers (UCLA defensive end) Cassius Marsh chasing me with his helmet.”

“We were blowing them out and they were in their feelings about it, that’s why the fight started,” Richardson said.

The Wildcats went on to win the game 48-12, snapping a five-game losing streak. Interim coach Tim Kish would lose his next three games before finishing with wins over Arizona State and Louisiana-Lafayette.

Ten players, including Richardson, were suspended for their roles in the brawl.

“After all that stuff happened, regardless of suspensions or people missing games,” said Fischer, “we put a major ass-whooping on them, which we’re always going to be happy about.”

The aftermath

The morning after Lankow’s overnight stay with UAPD, he was picked up by a friend who handed him her phone with Facebook opened.

“Just scroll,” she said.

“Every single post was about the game and me running on the field,” Lankow said. “That’s when I realized my stunt actually blew up.”

ESPN’s “SportsCenter,” “Pardon the Interruption” and “Around the Horn” talked about the prank.

“It was cool to be featured on shows I watch regularly,” he said.

Worried that the prank might derail his graduation, Lankow met with the UA’s dean of students. He was assigned four hours of community service at the UA — one hour for every second that remained on the clock before halftime.

Seven years later, the UA hired Lankow as a wildlife biologist. He said his prank was never brought up during the interview process.

“I don’t even know if my immediate supervisor knows about this, but maybe I’ll have to bring it up and ask him,” he said.

Lankow says he has “no regrets at all” a decade later. If nothing else, it’s a solid ice-breaker at cocktail parties. The first time Lankow met his girlfriend’s parents, they had the video cued up on the TV.

“It comes up whenever I’m asked what’s the craziest thing I’ve done,” he said. “It’s a fun thing to show the video and tell the story.”