Inside The Huskies

Ex-Husky Running Back Emeka Megwa Headed for Transfer Portal Again

The hard-luck player appeared in just two college games in three Oklahoma seasons.

Dan Raley

Ex-Husky Emeka Megwa (23) runs through a drill during an Oklahoma spring football practice in 2024.
Ex-Husky Emeka Megwa (23) runs through a drill during an Oklahoma spring football practice in 2024. / NATHAN J. FISH/THE OKLAHOMAN / USA TODAY NETWORK

It wasn't supposed to be like this for Emeka Megwa, who five years ago was the next big thing as a Texas running back.

Yet he's sadly become the second coming of Boobie Miles, the real-life subject depicted in the best-selling Friday Night Lights book and critically acclaimed film of the same name whose promising football career was canceled out by a debilitating knee injury.

On Thursday, Megwa was on the move again, leaving Oklahoma for the transfer portal, this after exiting the University of Washington two and a half years ago.

His career college stat line goes like this: 2 games played, 1 carry for 6 yards against TCU in 2023.

The 6-foot-1, 225-pound Megwa just went through another season without getting on the field, even sitting out the Sooners' 59-14 victory over Maine.

At Nolan High School in Fort Worth in 2019, Megwa burst onto the Texas scene as a sophomore sensation and eventual 4-star player by rushing for 1,786 yards and 27 touchdowns for an 11-1 team.

COVID limited him to less than half of that yardage total in 2020, but it didn't prevent more than three-dozen schools from offering hiim. Washington win his services over Alabama, Notre Dame, Ohio State, Georgia, Texas and many others.

Husky coach Jimmy Lake envisioned Megwa as someone he would build his program around, but the running back changed high schools to Timber Creek and suffered a knee injury that required multiple surgeries to repair.

To oversee his rehabilitation, the Huskies urged Megwa to reclassify, graduate early, come to Seattle and enroll early at the UW.

Megwa was an inactive member of the Husky football program throughout the 2021 season and into spring football the following April, with Lake getting fired and replaced by Kalen DeBoer.

Now after three seasons at Oklahoma, he's on the move again, looking for another way to get on the football field.

For the latest UW football and basketball news, go to si.com/college/washington

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Dan Raley
DAN RALEY

Dan Raley has worked for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, Atlanta Journal-Constitution and Fairbanks Daily News-Miner, as well as for MSN.com and Boeing, the latter as a global aerospace writer. His sportswriting career spans four decades and he's covered University of Washington football and basketball during much of that time. In a working capacity, he's been to the Super Bowl, the NBA Finals, the MLB playoffs, the Masters, the U.S. Open, the PGA Championship and countless Final Fours and bowl games.

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