Welcome to Sports at Large. I’m Milton Kent.
Nico Iamaleava is a quarterback with Tennessee and if his name doesn’t ring a bell with you, it will soon and not necessarily because of his productivity on the gridiron.
Iamaleava had a nice first season, throwing for 2,600 yards and 19 touchdowns with only five interceptions. He completed 64 percent of his passes and at the end of his inaugural campaign, Iamaleava did what many young athletes do, he asked for a raise.
When he initially signed with Tennessee, Iamaleava got a four year deal worth around $8 million, but he wants more. The team initially said no, so Iamaleava held out of his first preseason practices to force Tennessee’s hand.
Now, to many, this sounds like business as usual in 2025, except for this: Nico Iamaleava is not a rookie playing for the Titans of the NFL in Nashville. No, he’s a rising freshman just off his first year for the Volunteers at the University of Tennessee.
Having passed on the first chance to leave Knoxville a few months ago, Iamaleava has jumped into the transfer portal. More like was pushed, after Vols coach Josh Heupel said the team was moving on.
Meanwhile, more than 2,000 male and female basketball players have announced their intention to leave their current schools for theoretical greener pastures.
Indeed, within days of the end of the women’s season last Sunday, players from each of the Final Four teams – champion Connecticut, runner-up South Carolina, UCLA, which entered the tournament ranked No.1 and Texas – all sought to bounce from where they are.
The incredible rate of movement has thrown the world of intercollegiate athletics into complete and utter turmoil and I’m here for every bit of it.
This is sweet comeuppance for colleges and universities, the supposed bastions of truth and honor, who have traditionally forced the student athletes to remain in places they didn’t want to stay in for no additional pay beyond scholarships.
Meanwhile, the coaches move willy-nilly from arena to arena ignoring seemingly binding contract to go to their next stops without a lick of concern of the schools and players they left.
At Maryland, for instance, men’s basketball coach Kevin Willard or his agent was clearly negotiating with Villanova while leading the Terps to the Sweet Sixteen,
Willard made the divorce formal a few days after Maryland was eliminated from the NCAA tournament, leaving players and a multi-year contract behind.
Of course, Maryland officials wasted no time getting Willard’s replacement, enticing Buzz Williams away from Texas A&M in the middle of a contract.
And the universities themselves freely move from conference to conference, creating unholy new geographically incongruous alliances and leaving the old ones in the dust all in the name of…wait for it…more money.
With all that as background, Nico Iamaleava and thousands of kids like him have taken the hint.
They’ve seen the coaches and athletic directors and university presidents who are supposed to be role models of integrity go for the bag, as the kids say these days, the money bag to be specific.
The lesson they’ve learned: Just make sure your bag is big enough.
And that’s how I see it for this week. You can reach us via email with your questions and comments at Sports at Large at gmail.com. And follow me on Threads, BlueSky and X at Sports at Large.
Until next week, for all of us here and for producer Lisa Morgan, I’m Milton Kent. Thanks for listening and enjoy the games.
