2025 Montreal EDGE Emmanuel Nwaiwu & coach Jean Guillaume talk Michigan State offer, camp performance

East Lansing, Mich. – 2025 Canadian EDGE prospect Emmanuel Nwaiwu arrived at the National Collegiate Showcase in Detroit having never participated in a camp on U.S. soil. By the end of the day, the Montreal native was turning the heads of various Power Four coaches, including those from Michigan State, Michigan and Tennessee.

The 6-foot-5, 250-pound Nwaiwu’s athleticism and physcality flashed during the three-hour long camp session at Wayne State University on May 30. As a result, Nwaiwu – who has yet to receive a ranking from any of the major recruiting networks – spoke with several high-major coaches during and after the camp.

Nwaiwu, however, had to wait a few more weeks to see his eye-opening performance to bear fruit. 

It wasn’t until Thursday, during a FaceTime call with Michigan State general manager Cole Moore, that Nwaiwu received an offer from one of those interested schools. During the call, Moore handed the phone to Spartan defensive line coach Legi Suiaunoa, who spoke briefly with Nwaiwu before extending him his second Power Four offer.

“Man, I was excited,” Nwaiwu said, reflecting on the moment he received his Michigan State offer. “It shows that all the hard work that I’ve put in over the years is paying off. But this is only the beginning. I just have to keep going. Can’t let up on the gas right now. I have to keep training, keep working. Just because I got the offer, that doesn’t mean, ‘Oh everything’s done.’ I have to learn, I have to get better everyday.”

After evaluating Nwaiwu at the National Collegiate Showcase, Suiaunoa went back to East Lansing to review Nwaiwu’s film from last season. Nwaiwu played middle linebacker last year at Montreal (Quebec) Vanier College, mostly out of necessity. Still, he earned a spot on the RSEQ Division I Defensive All-Star Team for his performance at the position.

Though Suiaunoa likes Nwaiwu as an EDGE prospect, it was Nwaiwu’s speed and mobility at middle linebacker that caught the Michigan State assistant’s eye. 

“I’ve played d-line most of my life, but last year we needed a middle linebacker, so my coach was talking to me and he wanted me at the position,” Nwaiwu said. “I was like, ‘I’ve got you, coach.’ It was my first time playing middle linebacker. I didn’t know anything about middle linebacker. But my linebackers coach is a good coach. He trained me and showed me the ways of a middle linebacker. Over a couple games I started getting the hang of it, started learning it, and by the end of the season, I was going crazy.”

Establishing a connection with Michigan State

Given his Canadian origins and his parents’ Nigerian descent, Nwaiwu didn’t start learning about American college football until a few years ago, around the time he started to gain some traction as a recruit.

In his short time watching college football, Nwaiwu has learned a bit more about Michigan State as a football program and academic institution. 

“I’ve heard about Michigan State since I started watching college games, so I know that Michigan State is a strong team and that they’re competitive,” Nwaiwu said. “I know they have a really good education. I know that they’re one of the best high-academic schools in the state. They don’t really just take anyone, so you have to have good grades, and I’m working on that. If I go there, I know that, academically, I’ll be in a good place to do school and graduate. That’s the goal, not just to go play football.”

Around the time Nwaiwu received that initial impression of Michigan State, Moore made a trip to Montreal to watch one of Vanier’s practices. Moore had a connection to Vanier through Amy Soulis, the founder of the Montreal-based Athlete Recruiting Centre, a program designed to connect Canadian high school athletes with college coaches. 

Soulis also works with the Maroons Football Academy, a training program that helps guide players from the greater Montreal area through the college recruitment process. Nwaiwu has worked closely with Maroons Academy CEO and coach Jean Guillaume – himself an alum of Vanier College – over the past few years. 

Through Soulis, Moore reached out to Guillaume to learn more about the high school football scene in Canada, with the hope of re-establishing Michigan State’s once-strong Canadian recruiting pipeline.

“Cole Moore actually reached out as well to know about the talent in Canada,” Guillaume said. “That was the goal for him. He told me, ‘We want to recreate the pipeline.’ A lot of kids from Montreal went to Michigan State like (Ziehl) Kavanaght. Aldi Henry went there and had a great career.”

How Nwaiwu fared at the Wayne State camp

One of Guillaume’s primary responsibilities as the founder of the Maroons Academy includes taking athletes to American camps, like the one at Wayne State. Guillaume tries to make it to the Wayne State camp every year due to his relationship with Sound Mind Sound Body founder and former Michigan State staff member Curtis Blackwell.

“The goal is to get those guys experience where they can understand what it means to go to camps,” Guillaume said. “I start with the mega camps, especially the Wayne State one. Then we follow through with Mercer and Kennesaw State. Unfortunately Manny (Nwaiwu) couldn’t come to Mercer or Kennesaw State, but he would’ve killed it. He would’ve destroyed, just like he did at Wayne State. It was unanimous that he was physically the most dominant kid at the camp.”

Nwaiwu’s frame certainly caught the attention of several college coaches at the Wayne State showcase. He performed generally well during drills and the one-on-one portion of the event, displaying some quickness and phyiscality off the edge against various offensive line prospects. Guillaume, however, acknowledged that 6-foot-8, 340-pound River Rouge (Mich.) offensive lineman Jaylen Pitts gave Nwaiwu the most trouble that day. 

Nwaiwu beat Pitts off the edge during a rep or two, but Pitts got the better of Nwaiwu later in the one-on-one portion of the showcase. Pitts, a class of 2025 recruit, had a good day in a competitive environment, and he wasn’t afraid to let Nwaiwu or anyone else know about it.

“They were going at it,” Guillaume said with a laugh. “I love when those guys come to camp and they find the competition. Competition makes you better and it breeds success.

“I’ve been there with many guys, their first camps. I push them, but it’s fun to see how the first camp shows you who they really are. Some kids, their first camp will just crumble them. Some kids, like Manny, their first camp will just light a spark and they just want to go and fix it. But I told him, ‘Don’t worry about that. It was your first experience. Now you know what it takes.’ Since then, you can tell the kid has a fire in his eyes. He wants to go and succeed.”

“That kid has that dawg in him,” Guillaume continued, referring to Nwaiwu. “He’s not going to back down. He’s only going to go one way, and that’s forward. He has really stood out. Physically, he’s mature. You can tell.”

Ultimately, Nwaiwu’s goal was to leave a good impression on the coaches at the camp. Both he and Guillaume felt like Nwaiwu achieved that goal, as evidenced by his Michigan State offer. 

“God is good,” Guillaume said. “That was a kid who was looking for and dreaming of an opportunity, and everything happened (right). He’s proud now to be able to receive a full scholarship from Michigan State.”

Nwaiwu’s plans for the fall

Nwaiwu holds four additional Division I offers from Boise State, Boston College, Akron and Maine. He speaks with all of those schools fairly regularly, but he has yet to officially visit any of them. He plans to at least visit Michigan State and Boise State during or after the upcoming football season. 

Like most American programs, Vanier plays its games on Saturdays, so game day visits might be hard to come by for Nwaiwu. Either way, he plans to make it to East Lansing at some point this fall.

“We don’t have an official date, but it’s going to happen for sure,” said Nwaiwu, who also doesn’t have a commitment date in mind. “I spoke to Boise State and Michigan State. Those visits are going to be happening, if not this season, then after this season.”

“All of this is happening so fast, so I’m just going with the flow right now,” Nwaiwu continued. “I’ve got to move and make sure everything goes right. It’s a process. You can’t rush this.”

In the meantime, Nwaiwu and his teammates will continue to train for their upcoming football season. Guillaume credits Nwaiwu’s work ethic for getting him to this point, but bigger goals still lie on the horizon.

“If a kid really wants it, (good) things usually happen,” Guillaume said. “Manny wanted it and (he) put in work. He worked his body. Wherever we would go, coaches would look at his stature, his body type, his shape and they’d be like, ‘Wow, this kid’s been working out.’ So he looks good as an EDGE guy, and I would say even a versatile player because he can play in the box, play the line. He looks really good. He put in work, got in the weight room and got it done. After he did so, we were ready to go to camps, and that’s what we did. And it paid off.”

Photo courtesy Emmanuel Nwaiwu via Hudl.

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