Emanuel Wilson didn’t jog off the field on Sunday afternoon in Green Bay. He walked, slowly and deliberately, carrying more than the ball and the scoreboard. On the day of his first NFL start, the HBCU product and Green Bay Packers running back delivered the performance backs dream about: 28 carries, 107 rushing yards, and both of his team’s touchdowns.
He ran like a player who had been waiting for this chance. He hit holes with conviction, finished runs through contact, and never looked like the moment was too big. For much of the NFL world, this felt like a breakout. For HBCU football fans, it felt like confirmation. They already knew what kind of player Emanuel Wilson could be from his days at Johnson C. Smith and Fort Valley State.
They had watched him carry more than a rushing load. They had watched him carry his family, his hometown of Charlotte, and two HBCU programs on an unlikely path to Lambeau Field.
‘Hey, that’s Emanuel’: A Performance Years in the Making
Wilson’s first start looked like a continuation, not a surprise. The patience, the balance, and the physical finish on each run had been seen before on CIAA and SIAC fields. Now the rest of the country could see it too.
Johnson C. Smith (JCSU) head coach Maurice Flowers watched one of Wilson’s games from earlier in the 2025 season at home in Charlotte. In a phone interview with The Charlotte Observer, he said he never flinched when Wilson closed the game with a violent, 6-yard burst on third-and-5 against Pittsburgh.
“Hey, that’s Emanuel,” Flowers told the Observer. “Emanuel falls forward for yards — you very rarely catch Emanuel going sideways or backwards.”
On Sunday, the league learned that in real time. HBCU fans simply nodded. They had seen this version of Wilson before.
A Charlotte Kid Who Stayed Home Before He Was Ready to Leave
Wilson’s story as an HBCU player started with responsibility. Out of high school, he received an offer from an FCS-level HBCU, North Carolina Central. Still, he chose Division II Johnson C. Smith in 2019, just minutes from home in Charlotte. On BOXTOROW, he explained why he stayed:
“My mom… she’s schizophrenic, so that caused me to stay home as well,” Wilson said. “Plus, my sister was like two or three at the time… I was lowkey afraid to leave Charlotte.”
He became a star right away. As a freshman at JCSU, he ran for 1,040 yards and 13 touchdowns and earned CIAA Offensive Rookie of the Year honors. On the field, he looked like the kind of HBCU running back who could push for a shot at the next level.
Off the field, life felt heavier. Wilson opened up about battling depression in the article from the Charlotte Observer, even while the numbers and awards piled up. The loss of his father at age 10 still weighed on him. The pressure of caring about his family and his future did too.
Eventually, he realized that staying close to home physically was not helping him grow emotionally. He needed a fresh start. He also needed someone who saw more than his box scores.
Fort Valley, Maurice Flowers, and the Nights That Changed Everything
That someone turned out to be Maurice Flowers. When Flowers took over at Fort Valley State in 2020, he recruited Wilson out of JCSU. The move took Wilson away from Charlotte and into rural Georgia. It also gave him a coach who became more like family.
In the Observer piece, Flowers described their bond. “With Emanuel, sometimes that little bit more is, ‘Hey, I’ve got to spend a little bit more time with you just for us to talk,’” Flowers said. He added that he wanted Wilson to be “OK with himself,” even on days that did not feel like his best.
Wilson echoed that sentiment in the BOXTOROW interview. “Coach F is like a father figure to me,” Wilson said. “He the one that got me out of Charlotte and he really changed my life… I’m so grateful and so blessed that he came into my life at the time that he did.”
The growth did not come easily. At Fort Valley State, he dealt with a shoulder injury and the disruptions of the COVID-19 pandemic. He also dealt with quiet, difficult nights. “Them lonely nights… staying up till like 5 a.m. not knowing what I was going to do with my life,” Wilson said on BOXTOROW. “Just up thinking and crying and don’t know what I was going to do.”
Still, he kept working. He kept showing up to early practices on almost no sleep. He kept leaning on his faith and on Flowers. And, over time, he turned that internal grind into production. By his final season at Fort Valley State, Wilson rushed for 1,371 yards and 17 touchdowns. He became another HBCU back who had forced his way onto NFL radars.
Denver for Three Days, Then a Door Opens in Green Bay
The NFL, however, did not line up to draft him. Wilson went undrafted in 2023. Then the Denver Broncos called, and he signed his first contract in the league.
Before that first camp, he sat down with HBCU Gameday in Charlotte to film a pre-draft workout and interview. Flowers, already the central figure in HBCU Gameday’s Brick x Brick series, wanted to connect Wilson with Gameday cameras before he took off. In that sitdown, Wilson spoke directly to what it feels like to represent HBCU football on the NFL stage:
“They always gon’ count us out just because we at a lower division,” Wilson told HBCU Gameday. “But I already know—they gonna think we can’t play with the Division I talent. To me, D1 is just a name. If you can play ball, you can play ball.”
He spoke with belief. Denver did not share that belief for long. Wilson lasted only three days with the Broncos after rookie minicamp.
His NFL future looked uncertain again. This time, though, he had experience with doubt. He had already survived lonely nights and big questions about his future. Instead of folding, he waited. The Green Bay Packers and Pittsburgh Steelers both called with interest. Wilson chose Green Bay, in part because he had visited there before the draft. That decision changed everything.
Building a Role in Green Bay, One Opportunity at a Time
Since joining the Green Bay Packers, Wilson has built his career the same way he built his HBCU résumé: quietly at first, then loudly when the ball found his hands.
He had an emotional breakdown in the 2023 preseason. On the anniversary of his father’s death, he rushed for 111 yards and two touchdowns in a win over Cincinnati, as the Green Bay Packers’ own site later noted. He showed a mix of power and burst that felt familiar to Fort Valley and JCSU fans.
In a 2024 regular-season game at Pittsburgh, he totaled 87 yards on 14 touches, including 77 yards in the second half. That performance came in the first game after the death of his godfather, Shaun Duncan, and it showed how he uses football to honor the people who helped raise him.
Throughout his second season, Wilson carved out a real role. He rushed for 504 yards and four touchdowns on 103 carries, averaging just under five yards per rush, according to the Packers’ report. In short-yardage situations, he became the back Green Bay trusted to move the chains.
Hands Good Feet Good
He also started to flash as a receiver. On BOXTOROW, he laughed about how people assumed he was only a runner. “Really, a lot of people don’t know I can catch the ball,” Wilson said. “In college, I really just ran the ball… not really as much as I do in the league now. But I just try to maximize my opportunities and work on my catching each and every day in practice.”
When the Packers needed depth behind Josh Jacobs this season, Wilson was ready again. He stayed patient. He kept his routine, right down to the pregame moments of stillness.
In a feature on Packers.com, he described that rhythm: sitting under the goal post hood up, Bible open, letting the noise fade. He linked that routine to his past battles with depression and his faith in God. That same routine carried into his first NFL start.
The First Start and the HBCU Message Behind It
By the time Sunday arrived, the setup felt familiar. The Green Bay Packers needed him. Jacobs was dealing with a calf injury. The backfield snaps tilted toward Wilson. And an HBCU product had a chance to prove, once again, that talent from Johnson C. Smith and Fort Valley State travels just fine.
Emanuel Wilson answered. He ran 28 times, gained 107 yards, and scored twice. He looked like the kind of back who could anchor a game plan, not just spell the starter.
On BOXTOROW, before that opportunity even arrived, he spoke about what a start would mean:
“It means a lot… that the guys in here trust me,” he said. “And I’m always gonna give the credit to God just to put me in a situation like this.”
That trust showed on Sunday. So did the work he put in when no one was watching. For HBCU football as a whole, his performance carried a message. Wilson is from an HBCU background. He played at an HBCU in Charlotte. He became a star at an HBCU in Georgia. Emanuel Wilson did not need a Power Five logo on his helmet to become a starting running back in the NFL.
In the Observer article, he summed up that mindset for players coming behind him:
“I’ll be telling them, ‘You don’t gotta go to a big D-I school or a D-I school, in general, as long as you keep your faith in God (and) put up the numbers in college.’”
On Sunday, he did both. Wilson leaned on his faith. He delivered the numbers. And he carried the load and finished runs the way his old coaches always believed he would.
Still Grinding, Still Growing, Still HBCU Built
Emanuel Wilson’s journey remains unfinished. He knows that. In the BOXTOROW interview, he talked about the season in real time, about the ups and downs, and even a tie that felt like a loss. He also sounded like a player who believes another run is coming.
“The season… it’s going good for us,” he said. “I feel like we going to go on a run.” If he does, HBCU fans will follow every carry. They watched him stay home for his family. Leave home to save himself. Trust a coach who became a father figure. And turn three days in Denver into three seasons in Green Bay.
Now, they are watching something else: an HBCU product who refused to give up, who found the right mentors, and who finally got the chance to prove he can be more than a role player.
On Sunday, Emanuel Wilson did not just make his first NFL start for the Green Bay Packers. He showed everyone what HBCU football already knew. Emanuel Wilson is built for this. And he is just getting started.