With Tennessee football and quarterback Nico Iamaleava’s divorce official, the fall out is about where the two sides go from here. The Vols likely won’t be linked to any quarterbacks until the transfer portal officially opens up on Wednesday at the earliest.
But with Iamaleava’s intentions to enter the portal clear and teams unafraid of tampering charges, a few different schools have popped up as potential landing sports for the redshirt sophomore quarterback.
UCLA is the favorite to land the former five-star recruit according to BetOnline.ag. The Bruins are 2/1 favorites to land Iamaleava followed by North Carolina (5/2), USC (3/1), Texas Tech (5/1), Colorado (6/1) and Arizona State (7/1).
The two southern California schools make sense for Iamaleava given he’s a Long Beach, California native who played his prep football at Downey High School. Additionally, Nico’s younger brother Madden was a longtime UCLA commit before flipping to Arkansas on signing day.
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It’s unclear whether that late flip would deter UCLA from pursuing the elder Iamaleava brother but at the very least there is already a relationship between the two sides. It’s also important to note that any school looking for a starting quarterback in the spring portal window is likely pretty desperate.
North Carolina is a fascinating option and multiple reports have indicated that Bill Belichick and his staff are going to aggressively pursue a transfer portal quarterback this spring. The renewed NIL support around the North Carolina football program makes it feasible that the Tar Heels could at least be in the ballpark of Iamaleava’s high asking price.
*Since the time of publication, North Carolina is reportedly not interested in Iamaleava and will pursue a separate transfer quarterback
Deion Sanders denied interest in Iamaleava making Colorado an unlikely outcome. On3’s Pete Nakos reported that Tulane was one of three teams interested in Iamaleava as well as UCLA and North Carolina.
Iamaleava spent one season as Tennessee’s starting quarterback, completing 64% of his passes for 2,616 yards, 19 touchdowns and five interceptions. The Vols posted a 10-3 (6-2 SEC) record on their way to making the 12-team College Football Playoffs.
3 Responses
Anyone who takes nico is a fool hes greedy doesnt care about school pride just himself and the almighty
dollar makes him and his daddy hollar bet he gets hurt first 2 games wherever yhe BOY goes trader benjaman arnold!!!
The love of money…
Remember Nico’s track record. He got $2.5 million for 12 games and wanted to renegotiate his NIL contract in December before post season play.. greed.
Left his team high and dry without a word. Great teammate! Wherever he goes he will play a year and enter the NFL Draft.., buyer beware!!