One of the most beautiful things about college football is getting top witness your team win while key rivals and players you hate suffer in the same weekend. Tennessee football had one of those rare weekends to open the 2025 season, one that lifted morale on Rocky Top to a much higher place than it had been all offseason.
The Vols started things off with a dominating win over the Syracuse Orange, 45-26 at the Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta. They did it behind Joey Aguilar, the starting quarterback rejected by the UCLA Bruins last spring, where he transferred to after two years with the Appalachian State Mountaineers and three years of junior college before that.
A cast-off by a lesser program, Aguilar looked the part, at least after the first quarter, completing 16 of 28 passes for 247 yards while rushing for another 34 yards. He took quarterback play for Tennessee football up to a level it hadn’t been seen at since Hendon Hooker ran the offense in 2022.
What made it that much sweeter for Vol fans, though, is the reason they landed Aguilar in the first place. UCLA cast him aside to make room for Nico Iamaleava, who had transferred from the Vols, reportedly for less money because his team’s demands for upwards of $4 million were rejected.
UCLA got blown out by the Utah Utes 43-10. For his part, Iamaleava was just 11-of-22 for 136 yards, one touchdown and one interception while rushing for 47 yards. He drew a lot of criticism from fans online for overthrowing some easy completions and is already beginning to feel the heat of his decision.
Iamaleava’s camp has claimed his transfer was about the system, being closer to home and the Vols not doing enough to put talent around him. Based on the opener, either he’s really bad, or there’s less talent around him, and the system is worse. Simply put, it doesn’t add up, and Aguilar is enjoying what Iamaleava could have.
As if that wasn’t sweet enough for Tennessee football fans, though, the Alabama Crimson Tide losing in between the Vols and UCLA games made it even sweeter. UT’s hated rival looked a far cry from the Nick Saban program it once was, falling on the road to the Florida State Seminoles 31-17.
By the way, there’s another bit of karma from rejection with that. Bama lost after naming Ty Simpson its starter. Remember, Simpson spurned Josh Heupel and the Vols despite being from Martin, Tenn., when he was being recruited back in 2021. Sometimes, for better or worse, there’s a sick pleasure to seeing certain people suffer.
It’s still a long season, and there’s no guarantee any of these narratives will hold, but this is a week to week sport. Everything in college football is about bragging rights for fans who return to school or work the next Monday or Tuesday. Tennessee football fans gained peak bragging rights Tuesday on the heels of Labor Day.
