Michael George Wilson (born February 23, 2000) is an

American football American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team wit ...

wide receiver for the

Arizona Cardinals The Arizona Cardinals are a professional American football team based in the Phoenix metropolitan area. The Cardinals compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the National Football Conference (NFC) NFC West, West division, an ...

of the

National Football League The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ma ...

(NFL). He played college football at

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

Early life and high school

Wilson is the son of Orville and Ngaire Wilson. His mother, Ngaire, was born in

Wellington Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by m ...

, New Zealand, and Wilson is the nephew of

Maureen Jacobson Maureen Dale Jacobson (born 7 December 1961) is a former association football player who represented New Zealand. Club career Jacobsen played in England with Millwall Lionesses and was part of their FA Women's Cup winning team in 1991. She ...

, who played for the

New Zealand women's national football team The New Zealand women's national football team, nicknamed the Football Ferns, is governed by New Zealand Football (NZF). The New Zealand national team qualified for the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup, held in China in September 2007, sending the t ...

. Wilson grew up in

Simi Valley, California Simi Valley (; Chumash: ''Shimiyi'') is a city in the valley of the same name in the southeast region of Ventura County, California, United States. Simi Valley is from Downtown Los Angeles, making it part of the Greater Los Angeles Area. T ...

and attended Chaminade College Preparatory School. As a junior, he caught 70 passes for 1,278 yards and 12 touchdowns. Wilson was rated a four-star recruit and committed to play college football at Stanford after considering Notre Dame.

College career

Wilson played in all 13 of Stanford's games during his freshman season. He became a starter as a sophomore and led the Cardinal with 56 receptions and 672 receiving yards while scoring 5 touchdowns. Wilson caught 19 passes for 261 yards and one touchdown in the first four games of his junior season before suffering a foot injury. Wilson missed the beginning of his senior year due to the foot injury that he suffered in the previous season. He returned for the final four games and had 19 receptions for 185 yards. Wilson used the extra year of eligibility granted to college athletes in 2020 due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identified ...

and returned to Stanford for a fifth season. He caught 26 passes 418 yards and four touchdowns in six games before suffering a season-ending injury.

Professional career

Despite not playing a full season of College Football due to injuries since 2019, Wilson was drafted by the

in the third round, 94th overall, of the

2023 NFL Draft The 2023 NFL Draft will be the 88th annual meeting of National Football League (NFL) franchises to select newly eligible players. The draft is scheduled to be held in the plaza outside of Union Station in Kansas City, Missouri, on April 27–29 ...

Personal life

Wilson is in a relationship with professional soccer player Sophia Smith.

References

External links

Arizona Cardinals bioStanford Cardinal bio
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilson, Michael Living people Sportspeople from Simi Valley, California Players of American football from Ventura County, California American football wide receivers Stanford Cardinal football players 2000 births Arizona Cardinals players Chaminade College Preparatory School (California) alumni American people of New Zealand descent