Thursday turned out to be a day filled with drama and stress for Tennessee football fans everywhere. As most of you have seen by now, On3's Pete Nakos came out with a report stating standout Vols quarterback Nico Iamaleava was in active talks with the Vols over a new contract.
On top of that, Nakos left the door open for Iamaleava to potentially enter the spring transfer portal if things went south during those negotiations. Well, all of that appears to be news to the Iamaleava family. Late on Thursday night, the QB's dad posted on Twitter pretty much slamming the report and saying it's not accurate at all:
information. So y'all can ask them what's going on, cuz it ain't from us!
— Coach_Nic (@Nic_Iamaleava) April 11, 2025
Nico Iamaleava's dad has denied the Tennessee QB is looking for a new NIL deal
That's certainly one way to clear things up. As you can see from the two posts above, Iamaleava's dad is not happy at all with how things have gone down here. According to him, Nakos reached out to him and he told him the news was false from the start.
This weekend, Tennessee will be playing its spring game, but a ton of the focus is now on Iamaleava potentially putting the pen to paper on a new contract. As soon as Nakos came out with his piece, countless Tennessee fans voiced how upset they were with Nico, as he reportedly signed an NIL deal worth around $8 million before he even arrived in Knoxville.
A former 5-star prospect, Iamaleava just wrapped up his first season as the starter for Josh Heupel and the Vols. The stud QB helped power UT to a 10-win season and the program's first trip ever to the College Football Playoff.
The campaign ended with a loss to Ohio State, the eventual CFP champions. Looking ahead to 2025, Iamaleava is facing a ton of pressure to improve, particularly throwing the deep ball. He'll be ready to live up to the hype and if you ask his father, he'll be performing under the previous NIL deal he already signed and not a new one he's reportedly working to land.