Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava (8) walks off the field after the win over Kentucky after an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 2, 2024, in Knoxville, Tenn. Saul Young/News Sentinel / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

About That Nico Iamaleava and Notre Dame Idea

Originally posted on Notre Dame Fighting Irish on SI
By Nick Shepkowski | Last updated Apr 12, 2025 8:05 PM ET

The college football world was rocked with news on Friday that Tennessee starting quarterback Nico Iamaleava was suddenly asking for significantly more NIL money and threatening to leave the program.

Fast forward to Saturday morning and Volunteers head coach Josh Heupel seemingly had enough as the program decided to officially move on from Iamaleava the morning of its spring game. Not exactly ideal if you're a Tennessee fan, but honestly, good for Heupel and company.

There is a lot of finger pointing of who is in the wrong from afar, my view is that multiple parties can be in the wrong, but that one can be more-so.

Where Does Nico Iamaleava Go Next?

Before Iamaleava was officially even gone from the Tennessee football program on Friday night, speculation began to roll in as to where he's headed next. One analyst to weigh in on possible landing spots for Iamaleava was J.D. Pickell of On3, who offered the following on Friday evening.

If a deal does not get done and that results in Nico hitting the portal...

USC, UCLA, and Notre Dame could all make sense as landing spots IMOhttps://t.co/CGpk0ManQN https://t.co/DLvKHWkahj pic.twitter.com/gRe3DNjvKK
— J.D. PicKell (@jdpickell) April 11, 2025

Nico Iamaleava and Notre Dame Makes Literally No Sense

It's easy to look at Notre Dame, see a program that has taken a quarterback from the transfer portal in three of the last four seasons, and think it could again with Iamaleava hitting it. However, the difference between Iamaleava and the three portal quarterbacks to start at Notre Dame in recent years couldn't be bigger.

Jack Coan (2021), Sam Hartman (2023), and Riley Leonard (2024) were all graduate transfers that wound up at Notre Dame. I'm not iron-headed enough to tell you there weren't significant NIL dollars in play with the decisions but fit also did.

Iamaleava no-showed his teammates at practice because he was holding out for more NIL money. This being a team that played in the College Football Playoff last season. Iamaleava was a good quarterback, but some of the praise he's gotten is more about what he could be than what he actually is.

For instance, in SEC games against teams not named Vanderbilt last season, Iamaleava threw five total touchdown passes in seven contests.

And that's the makeup of the guy someone would actually want to bring in to give a massive amount of the NIL budget to, and to let cause instant shockwaves in the locker room the second any speculation would even begin?

Notre Dame might have a recent history of getting portal quarterbacks, but the chances that Nico Iamaleava ever wears blue and gold in Notre Dame Stadium is less than my chances of securing a weekend getaway with Sydney Sweeney.

This article first appeared on Notre Dame Fighting Irish on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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