Centre, led by Charley Moran, shocked many by taking a tie into halftime but ultimately Bob Fisher's Harvard squad took control in the second half and won the game.

Centre played well enough to warrant a rematch the following year, and the Colonels, led by quarterback Bo McMillin and halfback Norris Armstrong, again found themselves tied with the Crimson at halftime.

Regaining possession with several minutes remaining in the game, the Praying Colonels ran out the clock to secure a six-point victory and maintain their perfect record.

When team members returned two days after the game, they were received as heroes and were paraded down Main Street by a party that included Governor Edwin P. Morrow.

[3] They went on to win the Tournament East-West Football Game against Oregon, 7–6,[4] and were retroactively named outright national champions by two selectors, the Helms Athletic Foundation and the Houlgate System.

[7] The Crimson were again retroactively selected to a share of the national championship, though this time only by one selector, the Boand System, as the majority chose undefeated and untied California instead.

[5] After an undefeated start to the decade in 1910, the Centre College football team fell on hard times and went through a stretch of four years with a losing record from 1912 to 1915.

[11] All three players were named All-Americans by Walter Camp,[12] a sportswriter of the time (and former coach) who introduced the concept of the All-America team and has since been referred to as the "father of American football".

[5] They attracted attention with their win over West Virginia in November 1919;[14] the Mountaineers had defeated Princeton,[15] one of the Big Three and among the best teams of the time,[16][17] in a shutout the week before and went on to finish the season 8–2.

[6][20] Centre's team was called "the scoring machine of the football universe" by The Dayton Herald after totaling 241 points in their first three games combined.

[37][38] Centre's final game before the Harvard contest was in Lexington against the Transylvania Crimsons; the visitors led 60–0 at halftime and ultimately won by a 98–0 score.

[42] The last of Harvard's four consecutive shutout victories came against Indiana by a nineteen-point margin,[43] and they continued their winning ways against Georgia the following week by a score of 10–7.

[48][49] Kernan, Kunhardt, Rouillard, and Gehrke were the four changes to Harvard's lineup against Penn State the previous week; they took the field against Centre in the place of Henry Clark, Alexander Ladd, George Owen, and Winthrop Churchill, respectively.

[51] Centre was led by fifth-year head coach Charley Moran; the team captain was starting right halfback Norris Armstrong.

[32] Centre's offensive line was anchored by Ed Kubale at center, with Ben Cregor and Buck Jones at tackle and guard to his left, and Minos Gordy alongside William Shadoan filling the same positions to his right.

[52] The train carrying the Centre team left Danville early on the morning of Wednesday, October 26,[53] and saw crowds at their stops in Lexington,[54] Cincinnati, and Columbus.

[56] The Colonels experienced some changes in their squad compared to the year prior, including the departure of center Red Weaver, a 1919 consensus All-American,[32] for a coaching job at New River State College (now West Virginia Tech).

[57] Additionally, Centre was unable to field punter and end Ed "Lefty" Whitnell[58] for the contest due to his poor grades; rather than travel with the team anyway, he stayed in Danville and announced game updates at a local theater as they were received from Boston.

[70] From there, the teams traded punts and Centre failed on a field goal attempt of around 40 yards by Raymond Class, the only play of the game in which he participated.

[69] On the next play from scrimmage,[69] less than two minutes into the quarter,[22] McMillin scored the game's first and only points on a rushing touchdown when he faked a pass,[74] followed Roberts, who was blocking in front of him,[32] and evaded several members of Harvard's secondary[69] by cutting back just before he reached the goal line.

After the teams traded punts, Centre's Norris Armstrong intercepted a pass from Frank Johnson, giving the Colonels possession.

[78] It was then handed to future Kentucky governor Happy Chandler,[74] a former Transylvania University football player attending the game while a student at Harvard Law School,[74] who carried it safely away from the crowd.

[32] This was intentional, as Centre had intended to conceal some of the more elaborate parts of their gameplan until the second half so as to avoid giving Harvard the opportunity to make adjustments at halftime.

[32][89] The Centre victory was a shock, but perhaps not a fluke; the team finished the 1921 regular season 9–0, with shutout defeats of Kentucky, Auburn, Washington and Lee, and Tulane.

[91] Before announcing Tulane as their opponent, the school had received a $7,500 offer (equivalent to $128,000 in 2023) from the University of Detroit team to travel to Michigan for a Thanksgiving Day game, but Centre declined.

A&M held a 2–0 lead through halftime and scored three touchdowns in the second half to secure a 22–14 victory which itself was called "one of the biggest upsets of the football season" by the New-York Tribune.

[96] This game is also remembered as the birth of Texas A&M's "12th man" tradition after a former member of the A&M football team who was in the press box was called down to suit up by head coach Dana X. Bible, though he ultimately did not play.

[88] ESPN named it the third-biggest upset in the history of college football in 2006,[103] and the game was ranked fourth in a similar list published by Bleacher Report in 2011.

[108] Centre coach Charley Moran was inducted into the Kentucky Athletic Hall of Fame in 1963, and McMillin received the same honor on November 12, 2015.

[33] When asked about the prospect of a rematch, Harvard head coach Tim Murphy did not show interest, saying that his team would have "nothing to gain and everything to lose".