PASADENA — Nico Iamaleava had plenty of reasons to pack up, leave town and start fresh.

The redshirt sophomore’s decision to transfer to UCLA created national headlines when he arrived in Westwood in the spring and developed even more when the Bruins dropped their first four games of the season in humiliating fashion.

His head coach? Fired. His offensive coordinator? Left the university in the middle of preparation for No. 7 Penn State. The 30-day transfer window that opened when UCLA bid adieu to DeShaun Foster after the Bruins’ week three loss to New Mexico could have been a shining, glimmering life raft for a quarterback career that still holds top-end NFL aspirations.

Iamaleava did not run from the fight. He embraced it.

“It was just a lot of outside noise, coming into it,” Iamalea

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