Drake Maye came into the NFL with a lot of pressure. He played his college ball at North Carolina, which isn't known for its football team, and was drafted by the Patriots who were not far removed from having Tom Brady under center.
Maye wasn't the next successor behind Tom Brady, but after a failed experiment with Mac Jones, the New England faithful was desperate for a franchise quarterback. The Patriots decided to take it slow with their investment and didn't start Maye outright as a rookie. He ended up taking over after a Jacoby Brissett injury and showed flashes of what led to him being the third overall pick in the 2024 NFL Draft.
Maye had the odds in his favor of at least playing a sport in college. His whole family practically has. Here is more on Maye's family, including his wife, dad and brothers.
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Drake Maye wife: Ann Michael Hudson
Ann Michael Hudson met Maye in school while growing up. Some reports say that the couple has been together since middle school, while others maintain it was high school. But on Oct. 30, 2024, Hudson seemingly provided some clarity when she posted on her Instagram that they had been together for nine years. This would mean they started dating in 2015. Maye was named The Charlotte Observer's Male Athlete of the Year in 2019 as a junior. Counting back to 2015, that would mean the couple met in Maye's eighth-grade year.
Hudson also attended UNC, where she majored in business with a double minor in entrepreneurship and conflict management, according to her LinkedIn profile. Hudson herself has a family connection to football. Her father played at Wofford College, and her brother, Tad, played for UNC, backing up Maye in 2023. In high school, she was the team captain for varsity softball, field hockey and cheerleading. While she didn't continue any of those at Carolina, Hudson did coach a local 10-U girls' softball team in Chapel Hill.
The couple got engaged in January 2025, and it was a quick turnaround for the wedding as they got marred in June 2025.
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Drake Maye dad: Mark Maye
Mark paved the way for Drake, as he also played football at UNC. He was the QB for the Tar Heels in the 1986 and 1987 seasons. Mark was a two-time Academic All-ACC selection, boasting a 3.2 GPA. This helped him earn induction into the National Football Foundation's National Scholar-Athletes in 1987.
While Mark didn't have the same draft success as his son, he did have a brief stint with the Buccaneers. However, it didn't amount to much thanks to multiple shoulder and arm injuries. When it ended, he returned to Chapel Hill and earned his MBA from Carolina. He was also a member of the Raleigh-Durham Skyhawks, a short-lived NFL football team that lasted only one season.
Mark Maye college football stats
| Season | Games | Completions | Attempts | Completion % | Yards | TDs | INTs |
| 1984 | 11 | 10 | 22 | 45.5% | 93 | 1 | 1 |
| 1986 | 11 | 110 | 176 | 62.5% | 1,401 | 10 | 6 |
| 1987 | 11 | 143 | 270 | 53.0% | 1,965 | 9 | 15 |
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Drake Maye mom: Aimee Maye
Aimee is also from North Carolina, growing up in the Charlotte area. She played basketball growing up and was a star at West Charlotte High School. Aimee was named the Mecklenburg County (where Charlotte is) Girls' Player of the Year as a senior. She said she could have tried to play at UNC, but chose not to, instead settling for attending the school as a non-athlete.
Aimee was in school at Carolina when she met Mark as he had returned to the school after his MBA. Aimee assumed he was married with kids when she first saw him but accepted when he asked her on a date to Golden Corral. One of the stories her sons always tell about her is that she coped with raising four athlete sons by making 36 scrambled eggs at a time in a huge skillet. The boys would then compete over who could eat the most.
"I know for a fact every single time I made that meal, at the end of the meal, there was not a morsel of food left. And some of the boys would be like, ‘I’m still hungry.’ And I’m like, ‘too bad," said Aimee about the giant meal in an interview.
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Drake Maye brother: Luke Maye
Luke is likely Drake's most well-known brother. He played basketball at UNC from 2015 to 2019, meaning he graduated just before Drake arrived on campus. Luke was named the ACC's Most Improved Player in 2018 and helped the Tar Heels win the national championship in 2017.
Luke went viral, but it wasn't solely for what he did on the court. UNC was playing against Kentucky in the Elite Eight. Maye nailed a last-second shot to seal the game for the Tar Heels. While that was making all of the sports highlight shows, he went viral on social media because he made it to his 8 a.m. class the next morning and got quite the standing ovation, and his classmates acknowledged his shot from the night before.
Despite some iconic moments, Maye went undrafted in the 2019 NBA Draft. He was in the G League for the 2019-2020 season and then went to play overseas. He has played in Italy, Spain, Turkey,and Japan.
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Drake Maye brother: Cole Maye
Cole followed in his family's footsteps by being a college athlete, but he took a different route. Rather than playing basketball or football, the 6-foot-7 lefty was highly touted as a pitcher coming out of high school. He graduated a semester early to enroll at the University of Florida in the spring of 2017. Maye only played in five games and struggled as a true freshman. He pitched 3.2 innings and allowed five earned runs for a 12.27 ERA. Likely, he didn't care about it though, because the Gators went on to win the 2017 National Championship.
Maye redshirted in 2018 and then didn't re-join the team.
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Drake Maye brother: Beau Maye
While Drake is the youngest of the Maye brothers, Beau is the second-youngest. He was at North Carolina the same time that Drake was and was a walk-on member of the basketball team. Beau saw extremely limited game action, seeing playing time in only two games in the 2022-23 season. Beau managed to come down with two rebounds, but that was the extent of his presence on the stat sheet.
He was expected to return the following season but chose to end his athletic career. According to his Instagram, he is a high school head basketball coach.
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Where is Drake Maye from?
Maye was born in Huntersville, North Carolina, approximately 15 miles north of Charlotte. He went to high school in Myers Park and then college at UNC. His move to Chapel Hill was only two hours away, so he was still close to home during college.
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