From Tennessee to UCLA, Nico Iamaleava is getting a fresh start close to home

LAS VEGAS -- Standing inside the Mandalay Bay conference center, all 6 feet and 4 inches of him draped in a powder blue suit, there is nowhere for Nico Iamaleava to hide.

His hair is tightly braided and held by a rubber band, while black-rimmed glasses perch on his nose. Iamaleava's left wrist is adorned by a silver, diamond-studded watch worth thousands; his right is encircled by a pink elastic band honoring his mother, Marleinna, a breast cancer survivor.

Throughout the roughly nine hours Iamaleava spends at Big Ten media days in late July, his eyes dart in nearly every direction. Everywhere the 20-year-old quarterback turns, it feels like there is someone there to ask a different version of the same question.

What happened at Tennessee, and how did you end up at UCLA?

Iamaleava barely reacts. His soft-spoken demeanor does not give away much. He speaks of the appeal of UCLA, the chance to be home and close to family and, without much detail, of the way he feels his dramatic exit from Tennessee was misconstrued.

"I think just the outside world in general thinks that it was something that it wasn't," Iamaleava told ESPN in an interview that day. "A lot of people got it messed up with that."

In April, ESPN reported Iamaleava's camp pushed for a $4 million NIL contract for 2025 -- an amount nearly double his original agreement. Tennessee and its collective did not budge, and after Iamaleava missed a spring practice, head coach Josh Heupel announced the program was moving on from him. Iamaleava entered the transfer portal and soon after landed at UCLA.

"I think for me, going back home was always in the back of my head," Iamaleava said. "When the false narratives [about money] started coming out, whatever school it was ... that was my driving factor."

Do people believe him? Does it matter?

The saga that led Iamaleava here is neither fully in the past nor still brewing in the present. He and Tennessee have gone in opposite directions. The tense aftermath is just inevitable collateral damage, yet it still lingers in the margins of all conversations about him.

"A lot of those people can say that they wouldn't have [taken] him, but if they had an opportunity, I'm pretty sure that they would have," UCLA head coach Deshaun Foster told ESPN. "His situation is the exact same thing as everybody else -- he got in the portal, found a school and he's at a new school. He hasn't had any off-the-field issues; he didn't get kicked out of Tennessee. He didn't do anything."

As Iamaleava prepares to be the Bruins' starting quarterback and tries to move on to the next stage of his college career, his time in Vegas -- and the reaction to his comments -- was yet another reminder of his reality: All eyes are on him.

IT'S A JULY summer day in Lynwood, a city just southwest of downtown Los Angeles, where a typical Iamaleava family reunion is happening.

The Iamaleavas are the catalyst -- Nico's mom, Marleinna, and her sister are the hosts this time -- but family members from Utah and as far as Samoa have made the trip. All in all, the number of those in attendance floats around triple digits.

"It was big," Nico, who is one of eight children, said. Beyond the emotional camaraderie, two things, according to Nico, stand out about these family reunions: competition and cuisine.

"We're playing basketball, little flag football, tug-of-war, dodgeball, volleyball," Nico said. "We are competing at everything."

A mere mention of the food -- traditional Samoan dishes such as sapasui (Samoan chop suey), koko alaisa (a creamy cacao rice) and fa'alifu fa'i (a dish of cooked green bananas) -- makes Nico's eyes light up.

"A lot of those Samoan dishes I hadn't seen or eaten in a while," Nico said. "That's our culture."

If Nico had remained at Tennessee, there's a chance he would still be in attendance, visiting his family in the offseason. There's also a chance, however, that he would be in Knoxville instead, going through summer workouts and throwing sessions. But he is here, getting ready to play football just 23 miles northeast at the Rose Bowl.

"I missed the last family reunion we had because I was in Tennessee, so I was glad I was able to make it." Iamaleava said. "I haven't seen some of those family members in over a couple years."

Even after he stuck to his message at Big Ten media days and cited family as his reason for switching schools and returning home to Los Angeles, the backlash was immediate. His reasoning, to some, seemed convenient and even an obfuscation of the presupposed facts.

"It's a tight-knit family. Obviously [Nico's dad] Big Nic is the patriarch of the family. He makes a lot of those decisions. That's cultural," said Felipe Aguilar, Nico's former quarterbacks coach at Warren High School. "I think if it was any other player, everybody would understand [the reasoning]. But I think just with the way everything probably went down with NIL, people are always going to be skeptical."

To hear Iamaleava speak of his family, however, sheds light on the complexity of the issue, especially when he talks about his mom. Marleinna was diagnosed with breast cancer in late 2020, is now cancer-free, and Nico remains close with her. More specifically, he cited how the travel from Los Angeles to Tennessee took a toll on her, going as far as to say that he didn't just want to be closer to her and his family, but that he felt like he "needed" to.

"I think it's hard to say that he was going to come home, because he did love how the people in Knoxville treated him. He loved how the coaches treated him and he loved the whole culture of Tennessee," Aguilar said. "But I just think out of anybody, he missed mom, he missed being around mom all the time, and that's kind of where he needed to fill that void, I believe."

It wasn't just Nico. His younger brother Madden, an incoming freshman who had committed to UCLA before changing his decision to Arkansas last December, reversed course again, joining his brother in Westwood and turning the entire transaction into a full family affair.

Still, the way it all unspooled left a chasm primed for dissenting opinions, conflicting reports and, ultimately, a certain kind of perception that coalesced around Nico himself. None of that, however, appears to make him flinch.

"I really don't care," he said. "I know who I am, my family knows who I am and I'm excited to be at UCLA."

JUST ABOUT 50 miles south of the UCLA campus in Costa Mesa, the Bruins are starting their fall camp, and even here, where no fans are in sight and the media are allowed only small glimpses of what the team is doing, Iamaleava is the center of attention.

Every time he touches the ball, reporters scribble on their notebooks or type on their phones -- anything he does or fails to do is noteworthy. And in this small window where, much like in the NFL preseason, every play can be extrapolated to its extreme, Iamaleava looks good. The ball jumps off his right hand with ease. His height alone makes him stand out, and the way that he effortlessly appears to glide from play to play and drill to drill is impossible to avoid.

In the tumult of the past few months, it can be easy to forget that there was a reason Iamaleava was once so highly coveted as a consensus five-star recruit -- a player branded as the $8 million quarterback before he even stepped on campus.

"His ability to just make everything seem easy has always stood out, and a lot of times it may look like he doesn't care, even though he cares more than anybody you can think of," Aguilar said. "I always told him, don't let anybody see whether you're doing well or not doing well."

Nearly every player who does a post-practice interview is asked about Iamaleava. Even though they went into spring camp expecting their quarterback to be App State transfer Joey Aguilar -- who eventually transferred to Tennessee -- UCLA players took the detour in stride and readily welcomed their new teammate. It helped that several local UCLA players either had grown up playing against Iamaleava or knew of him.

"I've been around him since high school, so I already knew him for a long time," said linebacker JonJon Vaughns, who played at local high school St. John's Bosco. "I think he just felt comfortable right away. It felt like home, and we welcomed him like he'd been here five years."

For incoming offensive coordinator and quarterbacks coach Tino Sunseri, a quarterback of Iamaleava's caliber is a godsend he didn't ask for, but also one he isn't shying away from. Sunseri is well-known for developing underrated quarterbacks -- having done so at James Madison and at Indiana last season with Kurtis Rourke. Iamaleava presents something else entirely.

"Whenever you're able to have a chance to be able to bring in a special talent, it's only so often you get an opportunity like that," Sunseri said. "You feel like you want to be able to bring those guys in to give your team a better chance to win."

In the middle of the numerous opinions and reports surrounding the UCLA-bound Iamaleava, Sunseri had one priority: get on the phone with his new quarterback as soon as possible. Sunseri was seeking connection before talking X's and O's, and he and Iamaleava connected on their backgrounds and the way each of their families -- be they Italian or Polynesian -- prioritized those closest to them.

"It needs to be to where we're able to know each other, [know] what each of us is thinking, so we can be able to start anticipating what's coming next," Sunseri said of the coach-quarterback relationship.

Sunseri and Iamaleava could not have more different personalities. Iamaleava talks softly, whereas every word Sunseri speaks feels like it's coming from a megaphone. Football is the bonding agent they're hoping turns into a kind of mutually beneficial offensive symphony.

"He's a high-energy guy, man," Iamaleava said of Sunseri. "I wanted to go play with him the first day I met him. He just has that certain presence."

Sunseri prides himself on his experience, which he says has helped him build a scheme around a player and not the other way around at each stop he has made. Still, the pro-style offense that Sunseri brings, the one that appealed to Iamaleava, is being built through the air and by a player with a higher ceiling under center.

"We got an elite quarterback, so that's going to change the whole offense," running back Jalen Berger said. "He can make any throw."

Although Iamaleava's talent is obvious and Foster, Sunseri and UCLA players can't help but acknowledge it, he has had to strike the balance between stepping into a role that inherently requires leadership and not getting too ahead of himself as a newcomer trying to earn his teammates' trust. So far, Iamaleava appears to be taking the challenge in stride.

He organized player-led throwing sessions over the summer, and with the season opener days away, he has found a kinship with the players who make up this team.

"They got a lot of guys in there who already had a chip on their shoulder," Iamaleava said of UCLA's roster. "I'm joining them with an even heavier chip on mine."

Historically, the Bruins' football program has been second fiddle to USC in its own city. Last year's 5-7 season, the first under Foster, was the worst since 2019 and prompted Foster to completely revamp his coaching staff. In short: Iamaleava needed a new home; the program needed a splash.

"He's bringing attention to our program," Foster said. "And I just have to let our guys know that he's giving you guys an opportunity, because more people are willing to see you play. More people get to see you play. We just got to capitalize on the situation."

From the moment Foster gave his first public comments about Iamaleava in July, through the decision to thrust him into the spotlight at Big Ten media days, the tone has been clear: For UCLA, any publicity is good publicity, and adding a quarterback this talented, with playoff experience, was a no-brainer.

"Obviously him coming from such a big school and big conference, that elevates our style of play too," offensive lineman Garrett DiGiorgio said. "[He's] honestly a dream quarterback for us."

Foster has not shied away from the fact that UCLA, as a football program, needs to be more visible and recognized. But although he has implored players to "not get caught up in the noise," he has also limited media access and player interviews during fall camp for fear of the team's strategy becoming public knowledge.

"It's tough, but we are trying to win games," Foster said. "I'm not worried about marketing. If you win games, you're marketed."

The buzz, whether positive, negative or neutral, has descended upon Westwood this offseason. And while seemingly everyone in blue and gold is figuring out just how to embrace it and use it to their advantage, Foster, Iamaleava and the rest of the UCLA program know deep down that once kickoff arrives, any opinions of their union that might have been influenced by past actions will now be determined by two things: wins and losses.