The Athletic makes unsavory prediction for Tennessee Vols and QB Nico Iamaleava in 2025
The Athletic's Manny Navarro made a prediction this week for the Tennessee Vols and rising redshirt sophomore quarterback Nico Iamaleava that UT football fans might find a bit unsavory. Navarro doesn't think the Vols will reach the College Football Playoff in 2025 and he cited quarterback play as one of the reasons why he thinks […]
The Athletic's Manny Navarro made a prediction this week for the Tennessee Vols and rising redshirt sophomore quarterback Nico Iamaleava that UT football fans might find a bit unsavory.
Navarro doesn't think the Vols will reach the College Football Playoff in 2025 and he cited quarterback play as one of the reasons why he thinks that will be the case.
To be fair, Navarro doesn't think that highly of the Georgia Bulldogs, either. His prediction is that the winner of the Tennessee vs Georgia game in Knoxville in Week 3 of the 2025 college football season will reach the playoff while the loser will be left out.
Navarro has Georgia winning that game.
From The Athletic: So, how many teams will the SEC get into the CFP? My educated guess is four. You’d think the Bulldogs and Volunteers would have to be favorites after making the field last season. But it feels like a much more wide-open SEC race than a year ago when I correctly forecast the Georgia-Texas championship rematch in Atlanta.
The bottom line here is I don’t believe either one of these programs will get the kind of quarterback play it needs to get to the SEC title game, and only one of them will make the Playoff field in 2025. That’s the winner of this meeting: Georgia.
Tennessee reached the College Football Playoff in 2024 for the first time in program history.
We'll see how Navarro's prediction plays out this fall. For now, it's nothing more than extra bulletin board material for Tennessee's locker room.
I'm sure, though, that Vols fans will bookmark Navarro's comments and let him hear about it if Tennessee is a playoff team this winter.
