Right as one member of the Iamaleava family left the transfer portal, another has entered — with both brothers set for the same destination.

Arkansas quarterback Madden Iamaleava, the younger brother of Tennessee-turned-UCLA quarterback Nico Iamaleava, plans to enter the transfer portal, according to a report Monday from CBS Sports.

Madden Iamaleava has informed the Arkansas coaching staff that he plans to join his older brother at UCLA, according to a report from ESPN’s Chris Low.

Madden Iamaleava was an early enrollee with the Razorbacks who just completed spring practice with the program ahead of what would have been his freshman season. The younger Iamaleava brother was a four-star recruit in the 2025 class, according to 247Sports’ composite rankings. The 6-foot-3, 191-pound passer was the No. 22 quarterback and No. 271 overall player in his class. 

He committed to and signed with Arkansas last December before enrolling in January. He had committed to UCLA last May before decommitting in December.

As a high school junior, Madden Iamaleava threw for more than 3,600 yards, along with 43 touchdowns and just four interceptions. He was declared ineligible for what would have been his senior year of high school football after transferring from Warren High School in California to Long Beach Polytechnic.

Madden Iamaleava’s move came just one day after his older brother announced his commitment to UCLA after a contentious and high-profile split with Tennessee, where he was the starting quarterback last season for a Vols team that made the College Football Playoff.

Nico Iamaleava’s abrupt and unexpected exit came after he missed a spring practice while he was reportedly in negotiations with the program over his name, image and likeness deal. Iamaleava, who had been slated to make $2.2 million in the last year of a four-year contract he signed with a Tennessee NIL collective his senior year of high school, was reportedly seeking $4 million.

Madden Iamaleava’s anticipated cross-country move caps off a busy 36 hours for the UCLA quarterback room. On Monday, shortly after Nico Iamaleava’s commitment to UCLA, Joey Aguilar, an Appalachian State transfer who signed with the Bruins in December, entered the portal. By the end of the day, he had found a new home, with ESPN reporting he plans to sign with Tennessee, completing a quarterback trade few, if any, could have seen coming two weeks earlier.

College football is in a perfectly fine and reasonable state. Why do you ask?

A day after former Tennessee quarterback Nico Iamaleava committed to UCLA, transfer Joey Aguilar — who transferred to the Bruins from Appalachian State in ‘The Portal: Winter Edition’ — is reportedly signing with the Vols, per ESPN’s Chris Low.

Per On3’s Pete Nakos, Tennessee reached out to recruit Aguilar to Knoxville, and an agreement was quickly reached to add Aguilar to a quarterback room that includes Jake Merklinger and George MacIntyre.

It was, indeed, a quick turnaround for Aguilar. It was reported Monday morning he was hitting the transfer portal after Iamaleava was added to an already outrageously crowded UCLA QB room. Now, he will enter an ostensibly more competitive situation at Tennessee after not seeing the field with the Bruins.

Joey Aguilar stats

Aguilar played two seasons at Appalachian State, completing 511 of 850 passes (60.1%) for 6,760 yards, 56 touchdowns and 24 interceptions. Aguilar threw an FBS-leading 14 interceptions in 2024.

• 2023 stats (with Appalachian State): 293 for 460, 3,757 yards, 33 TDs, 10 interceptions
• 2024 stats (with Appalachian State): 218 for 390, 3,003 yards, 23 TDs, 14 interceptions

Tennessee QB depth chart

Tennessee’s depth chart at quarterback includes two scholarship quarterbacks: Merklinger, a redshirt freshman, and MacIntyre, a freshman.

Aguilar immediately becomes the most experienced QB in the room, and if the post-2023 iteration of him were heading to Tennessee he might be considered a frontrunner to be a starter. However, a turnover-prone 2024 that saw an FBS-leading 14 interceptions means he’ll compete. But he has to prove he can protect the ball.

• Jake Merklinger (Redshirt freshman)
• George MacIntyre (Freshman)
• Joey Aguilar (Senior)

There’s a whole lot of buzz about running backs as the clock ticks toward the NFL Draft. And so many reasons for the hype.

Perhaps Jeanty – instead of unicorn Travis Hunter, projected No. 1 overall pick Cam Ward, Shedeur Sanders or QB-seeking edge rusher Abdul Carter – will ultimately prove to be the biggest prize of the draft that kicks off in Green Bay on Thursday night.

Maybe. Maybe not. That’s part of the intrigue. Mock drafts will soon get flushed down the toilet and in time the wisdom (or lack thereof) by decision-makers will be revealed.

Then there’s the Saquon Barkley factor. The New York Giants, who picked Barkley No. 2 overall in 2018, deemed him too expensive to keep over since-released quarterback Daniel Jones. Too bad. Barkley took his talents to the Philadelphia Eagles last season and with a Super Bowl trophy now in the mix, added quite a layer to the debate about running back value…while the G-men without him were bad enough to secure the third pick.

With Barkley’s fresh impact, it sure seems like a good time to be a stud running back.

What’s a running back worth? That’s still a riveting subplot for this draft, 30 years since the Cincinnati Bengals made Ki-Jana Carter the last running back taken No. 1 overall. Sure, quarterback is football’s most important position. Yet, as amplified each January on the road to the Super Bowl, impact running backs are so essential to the mission.

The value is embodied by examples such as Barkley, Derrick Henry, Bijan Robinson, Christian McCaffrey and Alvin Kamara.

And here’s something else to consider: While running backs increasingly take on a larger role in the passing game, the NFL just had a season with its fewest passing attempts per game (32.7) by teams since 2008. Meanwhile, although running quarterbacks account for some of this, the 119.8 rushing yards per game were second-most since 1989.

‘Let’s not kid ourselves,’ Atlanta Falcons coach Raheem Morris said during the recent NFL league meetings. “I can’t believe we’re talking about the devaluation at the position and all those things.’

‘I think the position’s become more dynamic,’ Buffalo Bills GM Brandon Beane said during the NFL scouting combine, alluding to the mismatches that can be created. “For a while…the market maybe was suppressed. People were not looking at them as weapons.

“Some of the names you guys have talked about – Saquon, McCaffrey, Kamara, those guys – they can line up and play wide receiver, they can line up in the backfield. And so there is more value to those positions.”

NFL mock draft 2025: If Shedeur Sanders, QBs slide past Steelers, then what?

Beane, whose offseason has included stalled contract talks with his 2022 second-round pick, running back James Cook, said someone asked about his philosophy for drafting a running back in the first round.

“I’m like, ‘I probably wouldn’t draft a running back that is three yards-and-a-cloud-of-dust,’ but if it’s a weapon like some of these guys we’re talking about, heck yeah I would,’ Beane said.

The 2023 draft, with two first-round running backs, illustrated that point. The Falcons took Robinson eighth overall, and in two seasons he produced 3,350 yards from scrimmage and 23 touchdowns. Four picks after Robinson’s selection, the Detroit Lions drafted Jahmyr Gibbs, which generated much second-guessing of GM Brad Holmes’ pick. Holmes knew better. Gibbs tied for the NFL lead with 16 rushing TDs in 2024 and in teaming with David Montgomery for a 1-2 punch, was the league’s fifth-leading rusher with 1,412 yards. In two seasons, he’s tallied 3,190 yards from scrimmage and 31 TDs. Now that’s some value.

Will that recent history serve as a harbinger for this year’s draft? After Jeanty, the next-highest rated running back is North Carolina’s Omarion Hampton, hailed for his complete package of skills. There are also high marks for a pair of Ohio State runners, Quinshon Judkins and TreVeyon Henderson, Iowa’s Kaleb Johnson, and so on.

Yet here’s the rub: While there’s no shortage of teams that could be tied to using first-round picks on running backs – the Las Vegas Raiders (picking sixth overall), the Chicago Bears (10^th), the Dallas Cowboys (12^th) and Denver Broncos (20^th) among them – there’s still the reason that more than two running backs have been taken in the first round just three times in the past 15 drafts. Last year, none went in the first round and just one running back was picked in the first two rounds. The consensus all-rookie running back from 2024, Tampa Bay’s Bucky Irving, was a fourth-round pick.

Other positions, such as edge rusher or offensive tackle, still represent much more of a premium. So, even though there are 10 running backs listed on USA Today’s Big Board of the top 101 draft prospects, it’s a stretch to expect this will be the Year of the Running Back.

If the crop is so deep, teams may lean toward so-called premium positions earlier in the draft while figuring they can fill running back needs later. We’ll see. The laws of supply and demand are in play, too, right along with the projected shorter life span for running backs.

Then again, Todd McShay, the longtime draft analyst, contends, ‘Talent trumps trends.’

McShay, who analyzes the draft for The Ringer and Spotify, told USA Today Sports’ Chris Bumbaca that he considers this draft setting up as a “perfect storm” for impact running backs because the deep crop aligns with a resurgence at the position.

“This class is just flat-out loaded with talent,” McShay said. “In 25 years of doing this, I haven’t seen this much high-end talent.”

The 30 running backs drafted in 2017 were the most this century. McShay noted of a crop that included McCaffrey and Leonard Fournette. He expects this year’s haul might top that.

‘The amount of talent and guys that can contribute and do different things at varying levels that we’ll see come off the board into the fifth round,’ McShay said, ‘but through the first four rounds especially, is going to be remarkable.’

Yet exactly when the big run on running backs occurs – Opening Night or Day 2? – will say a whole lot about whether much has changed in the NFL when it comes to the value of that position that teams can’t afford to be without.

Follow Jarrett Bell on social media: @JarrettBell

NEW YORK — The last time the Detroit Pistons won a playoff game, the Seattle SuperSonics were a month from selecting Russell Westbrook with the No. 4 overall pick of the NBA draft. Apple was still months from releasing the iPhone 3G — the successor to the original model.

In fact, since May 26, 2008, the date of Detroit’s last postseason victory, the Boston Celtics have won an NBA-most 126 playoff games.

On Monday night, facing the possibility of a second consecutive blown fourth-quarter lead, the Pistons finally snapped a 15-game postseason losing streak to even their first-round series against the New York Knicks. They won 100-94. And in the process, Detroit also surpassed another benchmark, another indicator that its culture is being reset.

“We did what we were supposed to do,” Pistons coach J.B. Bickerstaff told reporters after the game. “To win a game, on the road, to get home court is what we came here for. We approached it with a business-like mentality and learned from the fourth quarter the other night, but we just did what we were supposed to do.”

This season, Detroit posted a 30-win improvement over last year, the sixth-best turnaround in NBA history. The team has a burgeoning supernova in Cade Cunningham, a 23-year-old, first-time All-Star who dropped 33 points and 12 rebounds — 11 of them defensive — Monday at Madison Square Garden. The Pistons play team defense and hounded the Knicks along the perimeter, forcing them to miss their first eight 3-point tries.

And through the first two games of this series — even with Saturday night’s blown lead — the young Pistons showed they’re already ahead of their rebuild.

“We wanted to send a message,” forward Tobias Harris said after the game. “We were disappointed after Game 1 with what happened there, so we wanted to come out tonight and figure out ways that we could be better. … Our message was for us, internally, to show that we could close. Tonight was a great night for that. That type of feeling and that type of energy — we have a team that’s new and new to this feeling. We needed to understand how to close out a game in the playoffs.”

Just like they did Saturday night, the Pistons entered the fourth quarter with an eight-point lead. And also like Saturday, New York responded with a fury, tying the score at 94 with 1:15 left.

But point guard Dennis Schröder scored 20 points off the bench, none bigger than his go-ahead 3-pointer that was the eventual game winner.

The question now is whether Monday will be merely a culture-shifting victory, or one the Pistons can ride to a series upset.

Some of the coaching adjustments Bickerstaff and his assistants made before Game 2 suggest that Detroit could continue to find ways to attack New York’s defense. After the Knicks dictated the physicality with which they defended Cunningham in Game 1, the Pistons asked Cunningham in Game 2 to push the pace and get easier opportunities in transition. When asked about the shift, Bickerstaff did not divulge much, saying only that the Pistons “saw something” from game film that they thought they could exploit.

“He’s elite,” Bickerstaff said. “He is a superstar, and he played the game tonight as a superstar. He did what he needed to do to help his team win. He understood how aggressive he needed to be on the offensive end of the floor. So he was going to go out and be aggressive.

“He also understood how important finishing possessions was. He had 11 defensive rebounds; that’s knowing and understanding how to manipulate the game and make winning plays, whatever your team needs in the moment.”

The Pistons also moved center Jalen Duren to guard the shorter Josh Hart, reducing his impact on the offensive glass, an area where Hart can spark New York with high-energy plays. That left Harris to guard Knicks center Karl-Anthony Towns, a player with range who can stretch the floor; Towns took just three shots in the second half, did not score after intermission and finished with 10 points.

The Knicks, however, are also well-coached. They’re loaded with offensive firepower and will surely make their own adjustments ahead of Game 3 Thursday night in Detroit. The next test for the Pistons will be to anticipate any tweaks and devise their own — to avoid stagnation and retain homecourt advantage.

“It’s a great feeling, man,” Cunningham said. “It feels good to represent the city like we did tonight. It’s something that the city has been waiting on a long time, so we feel good about it and we’re ready to go back to the crib and perform in front of them.”