Tennessee’s highly-touted freshman quarterback Nico Iamaleava lived up to the hype in his first career start as he led the Volunteers to a 35-0 win over Iowa in the Citrus Bowl and earned game MVP honors.
Iamaleava became just the fourth true freshman to start a bowl game for Tennessee following the news that Joe Milton chose to forgo playing in the Citrus Bowl to focus on the NFL Draft.
The first drive of his first career start got off to a tough start.
Back-to-back penalties forced the Vols into a 1st-and-23 situation and then Nico was sacked to bring the Hawkeyes offense back onto the field.
Iowa marched all the way down the field to the four-yard line, but the Tennessee defense came up big to stop the Hawkeyes from getting on the board.
On third down, Andre Turrentine, making his third career start, picked off Hill’s pass towards the end zone to end the drive.
It marked Turrentine’s first interception of his Rocky Top career.
Sophomore running back Dylan Sampson also made his first career start for the Vols and racked up over 130 yards on the ground.
On the other side, the Iowa offense struggled to get going.
The Hawkeyes had three three-and-outs as well as a red zone interception through 20 minutes of play.
After forcing another three-and-out, the Vols took advantage on the other end.
Iamaleava picked up his second rushing touchdown of the day to take a 14-0 lead with 8:12 left in the first half.
Nico became the first Tennessee quarterback to score two rushing touchdowns in his first career start.
Freshman running back Cam Seldon picked up 33 rushing yards on the drive, including a 3-yard run on fourth down to extend the drive.
Iowa came into the game only allowing 102.5 rushing yards per game.
Tennessee rushed for 126 in the first half alone as it took a 14-0 lead into the locker room at halftime.
The Vols’ 14 points are the most Iowa allowed during the first half of a game this season.
