Pat McAfee Left ‘Very, Very Uncomfortable’ After Students Show Hat On Social Media, Compares Himself To Charlie Kirk

by Arop KualOctober 28, 2026, 4:37 pm >

Pat McAfee visited the University of Utah during ESPN’s College GameDay. A few days after the show, McAfee revealed that he was “very, very uncomfortable” with the experience.

McAfee was unhappy with how he was treated in Salt Lake City; it started with a social media post from the Utah Student Experience account, along with the school’s official account, asking students to do an impression of him.

He grew frustrated during the show when a student participating in the kicking contest said he was only attempting to kick for $1 million instead of the $3 million a BYU student got the week before.

“Alright, I hate this place. I hate this place,” an already frustrated McAfee said.

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McAfee later addressed his problems with Utah on his show. While referencing the video posted on the account’s social media.

“One kid goes, ‘Ah, he’s corny.’ Another kid calls me ‘creepy.’”

“OK, if these kids would have done this on their own blogs, all good. I mean, everybody’s taking shots at me anyways for everything; I get it.”

“Then the university puts that out. Like, as I’m about to go out and do an infomercial for the place, and then I’m walking in front of thousands of these people.

“This is how the university feels about it. It’s an uncomfortable feeling. I’m like, I’m getting a lot of shrapnel from a lot of places. The university is putting this out? That something I just had never experienced really in my entire life.”

During the show at Utah, McAfee took a chance to mess with the fanbase that had made it known they didn’t like him.

“It’s hard to pick against this mighty Utah student section, but I’m gonna do it 10 times out of 10,” he said to an eruption of boos. “Give me Houston coming out of here with a big-time ‘dub’ and proving that Utah hasn’t had to play anybody yet.

“Congrats to Houston getting a huge win here in Salt Lake City. Thank you, guys. I’ll never see you again, hopefully.”

Utah would go on to defeat Houston 21-13.

McAfee also referred to the assassination of Charlie Kirk while discussing his hate for the University of Utah on his show.

“I thought to myself, has anything like really scary happened at a college gathering in the state of Utah recently?

“Like, do we think we should be amplifying reasons for why people hate my guts as a university? I don’t know.”

“So it was just, it was a lot of mixed feelings for me going out there.”