The Office of Undergraduate Admissions reported that of the 7,638 first-year students on-campus, 3,618 did not have a roommate preference.

Considering almost half of incoming students decided to “go random,” the odds of ending up randomly paired with a close friend from home are extremely slim. But, two first-year students that have been friends their entire lives were randomly assigned to live together this year.

Meet childhood friends Arthur Minahan and Alexander Beitel. The boys grew up going to school and playing lacrosse together. Coming from Owen J. Roberts High School, the boys live about three hours away from campus.

The boys decided to go random after having successful random summer roommates. Little did they know that their “random” roommates wouldn’t be so random. The two now live together in Stuart Building, East Halls after being assigned randomly as roommates.

“I was shocked when I saw that I was rooming with Arthur, and at first, I thought it was a mistake,” Beitel said.

Beitel and Minahan both say they would have considered rooming together but didn’t realize the other one was going random until the last minute.

“I was actually really relieved but almost thought it was a mix up. One of our mutual friends came into my room when I was trying to log into housing and told me that he knew who my roommate was, so I was just like, ‘Yeah whatever.’ Then, he told me it was Alex, and I was pretty much mind blown,” Minahan said.

Thankfully, the two are pleased about living with each other. The boys are excited to be able to see a familiar face from home and to be with someone that they have already known for years. Apparently the random system is not so random after all.