Tennessee Not Included In One College Football Analysts Top 25 After Losing Nico Iamaleava
With spring practice and most of the spring transfer portal window in the rearview mirror, many college football analysts are releasing updated way-too-early top 25 rankings ahead of the 2025 season.
Fox Sports’ Joel Klatt is one of those analysts, releasing his new top 25 earlier this week. Klatt included 10 SEC teams in his top 25 but Tennessee football was not one of those teams.
The SEC teams in Klatt’s top 25 over Tennessee include No. 2 Texas, No. 7 LSU, No. 8 Georgia, No. 9 Alabama, No. 11 South Carolina, No. 13 Florida, No. 19 Texas A&M, No. 20 Ole Miss, No. 22 Auburn and No. 25 Oklahoma. Other teams of note in the top 25 over Tennessee include Baylor, Iowa, Indiana and Miami.
Tennessee was one of just three SEC teams to make the 12-team College Football Playoffs in the first year of its existence last season. But since its season came to a close with a loss against Ohio State in the first round of the playoffs, there’s been more bad than good for Tennessee.
The Vols failed to address needs at receiver in two transfer portal windows and their star cornerback Jermod McCoy tore his ACL in January making his availability for the start of the season uncertain. But most notably, Tennessee went through a public divorce with starting quarterback Nico Iamaleava.
More From RTI: Former Vol in the NFL Answers the Critics By Praising Position Coach Rodney Garner at Tennessee
The two sides split ways after Iamaleava no-showed Tennessee’s final spring practice before the Orange & White game. Iamaleava entered the transfer portal a week later eventually landing at UCLA. Tennessee added quarterback Joey Aguilar by way of UCLA and App State to compete with Jake Merklinger and George MacIntyre for the starting quarterback position.
Klatt, who is the lead college football color commentator for Fox, has had mixed opinions of Tennessee over the last year. He called Tennessee a national title contender following its win at Oklahoma, but soured on them a bit over the course of the season. He drew the ire of Vols fans after he made fun of their cigar lighting skills after beating Alabama.
Specifically on Iamaleava, Klatt believed he would improve and saw clear areas to do so after Tennessee lost at Arkansas. Most recently, Klatt downplayed the narrative that Iamaleava left Tennessee due to NIL negotiations rather saying it was due to Tennessee’s offensive system and its struggles creating NFL starting quarterbacks.
Despite a poor offseason to date, Tennessee has a very manageable schedule next season. The Vols face four teams in Klatt’s top 25 — Georgia, at Alabama, Oklahoma, at Florida— and face some of the SEC’s worst teams.
