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Dave Portnoy attends the 15th Annual Unconditional Love Gala on Saturday, July 20, 2024, in Southampton, NY. (Photo by Scott Roth/Invision/AP)

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Students hurry through the campus bookstore at BYU to prepare for the school year on Monday, August 29, 2011. SPENSER HEAPS/Daily Herald

Spenser Heaps

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Jon Chevrier serves a milkshake to Jennifer Stagg at the BYU Creamery Tuesday, Sept. 24, 2013.  MARK JOHNSTON/Daily Herald

Mark Johnston

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BYU football not only won on the field but also on social media last weekend, thanks to the help of a popular sports media figure.

Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy was in Provo for a BYU-Utah football pregame show and spotlighted what Brigham Young University and the city have to offer to millions of his social media followers.

Prior to his Saturday morning appearance on Fox Sports’ “Big Noon Kickoff” outside LaVell Edwards Stadium, Portnoy spent Friday visiting popular locations and posting video reviews of each of them to his combined 16.6 million followers across Instagram, TikTok, X and Facebook.

He stopped by the BYU Store, BYU Creamery on Ninth and Swig — and a handful of pizza restaurants — rating each of them on a 1-10 scale.

Clad in BYU gear, he licked cookies and cream ice cream outside the creamery, raving about how crowded the shop was for a Friday afternoon and declaring it “the best campus ice cream I’ve ever had,” offering a 9.4 score.

“Provo’s doing it for me,” Portnoy said. “I don’t need to drink. I’ll eat.”

He walked around the BYU Store purchasing merchandise, which he said he got to by illegally parking because he couldn’t find a parking spot.

Once inside, though, he had nice things to say, giving the bookstore a 9.6 score.

“It’s a gigantic store,” Portnoy said. “They also have homemade fudge, these cinnamon gummies, they’re making ice cream downstairs. … They even have a book about Cosmo.”

One of Portnoy’s most well-known bits is his pizza reviews, where he takes one bite of a freshly made pizza and rates it. He did a few in Provo, including one at Nico’s Pizza on Cougar Blvd., and rated the pizza a 7.4.

“I like how it’s thin, I like how it’s crispy. It’s pretty tasty,” he said.

Portnoy’s visit to Nico’s helped the restaurant’s popularity surge, as locals expecting his visit tried the place out in the lead-up to the weekend, and more people came after he visited. Nico’s Pizza said on Instagram that after Portnoy’s visit there were 12 straight hours of lines out the door and the store sold out.

“Due to the tremendous response from familiar faces and new customers over the last week, Nico’s Pizza sold out of dough late on Friday night and will be closed on Saturday, Oct. 18. We look forward to serving you when we open at 11 a.m. on Monday,” the post said.

The visit provided BYU and Provo as a whole a tremendous amount of exposure. Portnoy’s video on the creamery had 2.6 million views on X and 40,000 likes on Instagram, while the BYU Store review got more than a half million views on X and 26,000-plus likes on Instagram.

The content had locals brimming with excitement on social media.

“I can’t get enough of (Portnoy’s) reviews in Provo,” Jake Lee said on X. “Basically nobody that’s unaffiliated with the church or BYU has ever given this type of attention to our school. And, by all accounts, he’s loving it.”

“Dave Portnoy is praising BYU up and down this weekend. I am all for it,” Chase Swartz said.