Deion Sanders appears to refute report on Nico Iamaleava

Nico Iamaleava will be one of the bigger stories we’ve seen in the transfer portal upon his entry into it this upcoming week. Among his potential options, though, will not be the Colorado Buffaloes.

Deion Sanders responded to a quote tweet in reference to Colorado being an option for Iamaleava along with Oregon and Ohio State. Coach Prime made it clear that the Buffs are fine with the quarterbacks they already have.

Not True. & God bless we Good https://t.co/qo5t2u4nCV

— COACH PRIME (@DeionSanders) April 13, 2025

“Not True. & God bless we Good,” Sanders tweeted on Sunday afternoon.

Iamaleava took over college football over the end of this last week with the result of his negotiations with Tennessee. Those conversations regarding his compensation were reportedly ongoing coming towards the end of spring practice, ahead of the opening of the spring portal window, before he skipped their final one on Friday. That would be the end of his time on Rocky Top with the Volunteers deciding to move on without him and Iamaleava to be in the portal at its opening on Wednesday this week.

With that, Iamaleava, unless already planned something elsewhere, will likely have limited options. He will be unable to transfer within the Southeastern Conference due to league policy while other programs won’t bring him in either because they either already have their starting quarterback or won’t want to have that storyline.

Colorado could have been an option in what’d make a huge story even bigger with Iamaleava ending up in Boulder. The Buffaloes, in moving on from Shedeur Sanders, also don’t have a quarterback decided on yet for next season between their transfer in Kaidon Salter (Liberty) or their four-star freshman in Julian Lewis.

However, Sanders said otherwise with this post on social media. That’ll apparently now take one more team off the table once Iamaleava is officially in the portal later this next week.

Paul Finebaum predicts teams who could recruit Iamaleava, highlights potential ‘buyer’s beware’

The time spent for Nico Iamaleava at Tennessee came to an end on Saturday after it all deteriorated over the past week. Now, Paul Finebaum, like everyone else, is trying to figure out where he will end up playing next season.

According to Finebaum, teams on the west coast would make the most sense for the former quarterback of the Volunteers. He theorized Oregon and USC but, in doing so, also noted there will likely be some hesitation about Iamaleava due to how his situation went in Knoxville.

“He grew up in California, so you have to look to that direction,” Finebaum stated on SportsCenter on Saturday. “One interesting part of this is he can’t go anywhere within the SEC. There is a new clause – in the spring portal, you can’t go within the SEC. Now, you can do that in the portal that ends after the season. So I would have to guess the West Coast Obviously, there’s plenty of places out there — Oregon, USC, natural places.”

“But I wonder, how excited our school is going to be to deal with his representatives? And I say his representatives – his father is involved. He’s got agents involved,” Finebaum said. “This is a very nasty situation. It has left a stench across college football. So, I would say buyer beware.”