Getty Gregory Rousseau poses on stage at the NFL Draft.
Even before the Buffalo Bills took Gregory Rousseau with their first-round pick, the Miami Hurricanes star knew a lot about the Queen City.
Shortly after being taken with the No. 30 overall pick, Rousseau opened up about his family connection to the city and the strong impression that it had left on his mother. The story has helped endear fans to one of the team’s newest players.
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Rousseau’s Connection to Buffalo
The Miami Hurricanes standout was born and raised in Florida, but said his parents lived in Buffalo for a stretch in the late 1990s while his mom, Anne, was attending school and studying to be a nurse. They lived there for close to five years, he said in a post-draft video conference that the team shared on Twitter. Gregory’s oldest brother, Marvyn, was even born in Buffalo.
Rousseau said his mom gave him a general overview of life in Buffalo, hitting two of the major points about the city.
“She said it’s a town that’s all about football like it’s just football, football, football… and also she said that there’s Niagara Falls,” he said, via the USA Today’s Bills Wire.
DE Gregory Rousseau is your newest Buffalo Bill! #BillsMafia
Bills Insiders @MadGlab and @ChrisBrownBills are LIVE breaking down the pick.
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“My mom said it was really cold so I’m ready for that, I’m gonna make sure I bring jackets for sure,” he added.
And Rousseau added that he already has some rudimentary knowledge of the city’s geography, especially as the draft was taking place on the same Great Lake.
“I know there’s Niagara Falls there, it pretty much borders Canada, I’m pretty sure there’s Lake Erie so the same lake in Cleveland is over there,” Rousseau said, via Buffalo’s WIVB.
Rousseau still maintains some connections to the area, saying that an uncle and a cousin still live in the area. He is close with his immediate family as well, saying that he decided to opt out of the 2020 college football season in part to help protect his mother, who is a nurse working closely with COVID-19 patients — putting the education she got in the Buffalo area to good use.
Other Connections to Buffalo
Rousseau had some connections to the Bills even before his name was called near the end of the first round. He had a breakout redshirt freshman season at the University of Miami, notching 15.5 sacks and shooting up mock draft boards to the point that many considered him to be a top 10 pick. Rousseau’s draft stock sank a bit after he decided to opt out last season and lost out on the chance to follow up his amazing freshman season, but he had a fan in one Buffalo Bills legend and former Miami Hurricanes star.
Former Bills quarterback Jim Kelly took to Instagram to heap some praise on his fellow Miami alum, predicting that he will be a great addition for Buffalo.
“Love the genuine smile that Hurricane Rousseau has on his face,” Kelly wrote an Instagram post caption. “He is going to be a difference maker on that already good defense. Hurricanes are workers. Welcome to Buffalo.”
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