After leaving Tennessee, Nico Iamaleava drops a heartfelt 5-word message for former school

Former Tennessee Volunteers quarterback Nico Iamaleava has sent a message to his former school and teammates.

Iamaleava had a NIL dispute with Tennessee, which caused him to enter the portal and transfer to UCLA. Nearly 50 days since he left, Iamaleava sent a five-word message to his former team.

"gon miss my real ones," Iamaleava wrote.

The video showed Iamaleava and several of his former teammates and staffers.

Iamaleava was a five-star recruit coming out of high school. He committed to Tennessee as the second-ranked prospect. Iamaleava redshirted his first season and was the starter for the Volunteers last season.

In his first year as the starting quarterback, Iamaleava went 213-for-334 for 2,616 yards, 19 touchdowns, and five interceptions. However, he did struggle against the top-ranked teams, throwing for just 104 yards in the playoffs.

After Iamaleava went to UCLA, Tennessee landed quarterback Joey Aguilar, who entered the portal after Iamaleava joined the Bruins.

UCLA coach thrilled to land Nico Iamaleava

After Nico Iamaleava entered the transfer portal, he quickly landed with UCLA.

Iamaleava is from California, and UCLA coach DeShaun Foster was thrilled to land him.

“6'6", this is a big guy,” Foster said, via SI. “A true competitor. Fiery. Big arm. And then, it’s gonna—keeping the California kids and L.A. kids here, you know? This is a big thing...

“You want to be in conversations, you want to play big-time ball, you want to have haters, you want all of this stuff,” Foster said, “because that means that you’re trending in the right direction. So, if you want to play big-time ball, you can do that here at UCLA. I got a quarterback situation that’s gonna pan out for us.”

Foster said UCLA did its research on Iamaleava after the Tennessee saga and felt comfortable adding him to the roster.

UCLA will open its 2025 college football season on Aug. 30 against Utah. The Bruins have notable games against Penn State, Indiana, Nebraska, Ohio State, and USC.

About the author

Cole is an NHL, NFL and College Sports reporter at Sportskeeda with over 7 years of experience writing for publications like CBC, USA Today, SMG, BJPENN, Sherdog and SB Nation.

An NHL fan his whole life, Cole played rep hockey in Canada from age 5 until 17 and grew up rooting for Martin St. Louis and the Tampa Bay Lightning. His all-time favorite players are Vincent Lecavalier and Steven Stamkos, while Jon Cooper is his favorite coach of all time.

Cole attended Sheridan College and received his journalism degree in 2019. After decades of watching and reporting, he considers his knowledge of sports as his primary strength. He ensures that the same story has been reported by at least two reputed reporters before creating it.

Cole enjoys playing golf and spending time with friends and family when not reporting breaking stories. His favorite sports moment is from the 2010 Olympics, when Sidney Crosby scored the golden goal in overtime to beat Team USA for the gold medal.

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Edited by Cole Shelton