Fox Sports college football announcer and analyst Joel Klatt is often quick to rip the SEC and defend the Big 10. Klatt did both in one swipe on his podcast— The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast this week. Klatt eviscerated Josh Heupel and Tennessee for waging a “propaganda effort” against Nico Iamaleava.
“Here’s why I’d defend Nico a little bit,” Klatt said. “He never really got a chance to tell his side of the story. Tennessee ran out a propaganda effort and got to tell the story without Nico being involved at all. It was not all about money. It really wasn’t. If it was he wouldn’t have gone to UCLA which is the telltale sign.”
Tennessee and its returning starting quarterback Nico Iamaleava had a very public divorce back in the spring. Beginning with a Thursday night report by On3’s Pete Nakos that Iamaleava was considering transferring from Tennessee if they didn’t up his contract entering his redshirt season.
Nic Iamaleava, Nico’s father, publicly ripped Nakos that night and called the report inaccurate. But Nico no showed Tennessee’s Friday practice before that Saturday’s Orange & White game. With the writing already on the wall Saturday morning, Tennessee made it clear that they were moving in a different direction.
Most pointed back to Nakos report that Iamaleava’s camp was shopping the former five-star quarterback around throughout the spring as proof that he was leaving for more money. Klatt strongly deflects that claim, instead pointing to Heupel’s offense not being conductive to sending quarterbacks to the NFL, even calling it “a glorified high school offense.”
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“Nico understood that (the offense was a high school one) and knew that so they wanted the offense to expand and grow and develop,” Klatt said. “When it didn’t do that through spring football, that’s when he thought ‘I don’t know if this is the right place for me’ or the family started to think ‘this isn’t the right place for me.’
“Now, he never got to tell that story because Tennessee immediately ran out there and made it a money issue and tried to make it a virtuous route— ‘oh woe is us. Look at what our quarterback is doing. Holding us hostage.’ Which in the very same breathe or next sentence, Tennessee was turning around and contacting guys that were at other schools and trying to get them to transfer to Tennessee in clear tampering violations. Tennessee got away with all of this from a narrative standpoint. Which is unfair to Nico Iamaleava. And I hope he succeeds.”
Klatt makes one good point. Tennessee did tamper with multiple quarterbacks in the transfer portal according to various reporting this spring in summer. The Vols were unsuccessful doing so and eventually landed UCLA’s Joey Aguilar after the Bruins landed Iamaleava.
Where Klatt’s argument loses steam is when it comes to Iamaleava’s reasoning and logic. For one, Iamaleava’s camp has pushed their narrative constantly over the last months saying that he left because of the lack of weapons around him, the offensive system as a whole and to return closer to his Southern California home.
Secondly, Tennessee’s run the same offensive system since before Iamaleava arrived on campus. It would be bizarre for Iamaleava’s camp to draw a line in the sand about the offensive system after two years, especially in the spring transfer window when so few teams are searching for a quarterback.
After a summer full of back-and-forth, the true winner will be decided on the field. Tennessee opens up its 2025 season on Saturday when they face Syracuse in Atlanta. UCLA opens up its 2025 season at home against Utah at 11 p.m. ET at the Rose Bowl Saturday night.
