Wilson’s links to HBCUs, Black history fuel his confidence
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By HOWARD MANN
Unlike the first African-American quarterback to win a Super Bowl, Seattle Seahawks QB Russell Wilson didn’t post eye-popping stats in his triumph.
Washington’s Doug Williams threw for four touchdown and a Super Bowl-record 340 yards when he led his team past John Elway’s Denver Broncos. Wilson’s numbers were much more modest Sunday night – two touchdowns and 340 yards – in leading his team past Peyton Manning’s Denver Broncos.
Williams is part of HBCU football royalty, a former Grambling State star who played for legendary coach Eddie Robinson. Wilson played his college ball at North Carolina State and Wisconsin.
But he has strong ties to HBCUs beneath the surface.
Wilson’s grandfather Harrison B. Wilson graduated from Kentucky State, was a highly-successful basketball coach at Jackson State and later became president of Norfolk State. Russell’s grandmother Dr. Lucy Wilson graduated from South Carolina State.
A great-great grandmother, Elizabeth “Bettie” Price Ayers, graduated from Wilberforce University in 1901. An aunt, April Woodard, is a professor at Hampton University.
His connection to the past wasn’t lost after the game.
“It’s something I think about, to be the second African-American to win the Super Bowl,” he said. “That’s history right there, man. It’s something special and it’s real.”
Wilson’s father died of complications from diabetes in 2010. But the belief he instilled in his son lives on, which helps explain how a 5-foot-11 quarterback can win the Super Bowl in his second NFL season.
“He always used to tap me and say, ‘Russ, why not you? Why not us.’”
That’s the question, indeed.
Whether we’re products of HBCUs, PWCUs or no CUs…
Why not us?
