Former Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava stunned the college football world last season when he decided to enter the transfer portal and go to UCLA.
Iamaleava started for the Vols last season and led them to their first College Football Playoff, but during the season and shortly after, rumblings began to emerge that Iamaleava was not happy and wanted out of Knoxville.
Soon after, he was gone, and many thought it was because he wanted more NIL money, but according to ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit, it was Iamaleava’s father who wanted his son to leave if they didn’t place more offensive talent around him.
But the younger Iamaleava said it was none of that. He said he wanted to be closer to home.
“Just false reports that made me not feel comfortable in the position that I was in,” Iamaleava said. “But in the back of my head I always wanted to come back home. And be closer to my mom, closer to my dad. And you know, just have my family, their support at our games. In our Samoan culture we’re always together, and I think that’s the main thing for me, the driving factor for me to come back home.”
Iamaleava was not pleased that Tennessee put out false reports about him leaving for more NIL money.
“Just false stuff about whether it was a financial thing or not,” Iamaleava said. “My driving factor to come back home was my family, and I hope every Tennessee fan understands that. That it was really one of the hardest decisions that I’ve had to make. But I had to do what was best for me and my family, and ultimately I wanted to come back home and be closer to my family."