"I love your a** right now": Nick Saban has special message for Nico Iamaleava after his UCLA struggles

Nico Iamaleava has not had the best start to his time with UCLA Bruins. The former Tennessee Volunteers quarterback (who left the program due to a contract dispute in the offseason) has led the Bruins to a 0-3 start and has struggled in most of these games.

However, former Alabama Crimson Tide coach Nick Saban had some positive words to say about Iamaleava on College GameDay:

"I'm taking UCLA, and if I was, I'm going to have a talk with Nico right here. I never rooted for you the whole time you were at Tennessee, but I love your a** right now."

One could consider this to he Saban praising Iamaleava and hoping he performs well in the Bruins game against the Northwestern Wildcats. This could very much be the case. But there is a deeper ulterior motive for the praise.

Saban picked UCLA as his "SuperDog" for this week. This is a segment on College Game Day where the panel each pick one "underdog" who could potentially upset their favored opponents. This competitive segment has a scoring system with points awarded for correct predictions.

This is something that Saban wants to win, so one could very much interpret these comments as Saban "backing his horse" (or, in this case, Bruin).

For context, ESPN bet make UCLA 6.5 point underdogs in their game against Northwestern. While this game is not unwinnable, it would be seen as an upset win for the struggling Bruins and Iamaleava.

Nico Iamaleava on the start to UCLA's season

The first three games of the season have not been the best for Nico Iamaleava. The former Tennessee quarterback has struggled, while he replacement at the Volunteers, Joey Aguliar, has been able to thrive. This week, Iamaleava spoke about his thoughts on how the season has been for him

"You can't dwell on these past three games, we really have to just focus on what's ahead of us. The season is still alive for us. Like I said, the guys, you know, we got nine more games to try and flip this around. So, yeah, it can be stressful at times, for sure."

A strong performance against Northwestern, one of the weaker teams in the Big Ten, could be what the Bruins and Iamaleava need to in order to kick start their season.

However, with games against Penn State, Indiana, and Michigan State to follow, a defeat could eliminate the team from Bowl contention.

About the author

Ben Tredinnick is a journalist who covers college football and the NFL at Sportskeeda who is currently studying for a masters in Data Science. His degree in Psychology has helped him gain an in-depth understanding of the minds of coaches.

Ben has been involved in sports writing since 2022 and covered the NFL previously. His strengths include providing in-depth profiles of athletes and coaches, with a particular focus on development, and looking at which teams could be in the hunt for today's college stars.

Ben enjoys following college sports more than the NBA or NFL because there is more variation in terms of playstyles. The tournaments are often more competitive than the major leagues, and due to the constant turnover of players, there are rarely any "superteams" in college sports.

He prioritizes research, looks at multiple sources and publications to make sure he gets the full picture of the story before writing. He tries not to write from a one-sided perspective to allow the reader to be able to make their mind up on their own.

A Texas Longhorns fan, as well as a massive New York Giants fan, some of his favorite college players of all time are Arch Manning, Tim Tebow and Reggie Bush.

When he is not working, Ben enjoys watching films (especially Godzilla) and spending time with his cat.

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Edited by Ben Tredinnick