Saket Vora

On Saturday morning, Amit came by and over pancakes and coffee we planned out a short video for the 2008 Stanford Innovation Tournament, part of the Global Entrepreneurship Week. The idea is this: you have four days to create as much ‘value’ as possible out of an ordinary everyday object. Make a short video and upload it to YouTube. The first year was Post-It notes, and last year was rubber bands. This year: bottled water. Oh the irony. Because you know, I happened to be involved with an amazing team on some water related issues this past year.

We were forced to participate in the last tournament through my Strategy course, and I didn’t want to make a really elaborate video this time. So I fell back on something I had thought of back in my senior year at NC State — the absurd fact that amidst all the screaming about gas prices, Americans pay more for bottled water than they do for gas. And the consumption of bottled water has only been increasing. A multi-billion dollar market for something that is substitutable by something just as healthy and clean  and 4000 times less expensive. So with my two Powershot cameras in tow, we went around campus and shot some scenes. By the time we finished, it was time for the University of Southern California (USC) at Stanford game, so we met up with Nader and Joey and walked over to the tailgate.

This game is of special significance to both teams. Last year, Stanford went down to Los Angeles and stunned USC by scoring the go-ahead touchdown with less than 1 minute to play. It was Tavita Pritchard’s first career start, and he converted a 4th and 20 down to Richard Sherman four plays before the pivotal 4th and Goal touchdown fade pass to the endzone, where Mark Bradford leapt up and caught the ball. Stanford then intercepted the ball and the game was over: 24-23 and thus snapping USC’s 35-game home winning streak.

The loss knocked USC out of contention for the national championship game and was noted as the biggest upset ever in college football. Needless to say, USC had a mighty big chip on their shoulder as they came up to Stanford this year. The stadium was packed (a lot of USC fans) and they even brought their entire Trojan marching band.

Before the game, we saw our glorious band march by, with several people in full X-Men costumes. On the field, we spotted the Trojan band with their Roman soldier uniforms (with capes!) line up in formation along the entire endzone, two men deep. I vividly remember a scene where the Trojan marching band filled up the entire screen in precise rows and columns, while the Stanford marching band, outnumbered nearly 3 to 1, huddles in a circle in one endzone. After every single USC play, their band would play the same stupid melody. In 4th quarter, as the Trojans scored their 3rd TD in a row, their band even mocked us by playing OUR fight song.

The first half was amazing. We piled on 100+ running yards on them, scored a TD on our first possession, and led the whole way.  Our special teams let up huge yardage on kick returns, including one momentum killing kick return for a TD just before halftime, where the score was 17-17. But USC started pulling away and ended up winning big.

After the game Joey, Nader, and I went to Max’s for dinner then back at the apartment I worked on editing the Innovation Tournament video.