The mom who taught Super Bowl QB Drake Maye how to stay humble

Charlotte's Aimee Maye has raised a crew of star athletes. Her youngest plays in the Super Bowl on Sunday.

The following article appeared in the Feb. 6, 2026, edition of The Charlotte Ledger, an e-newsletter with smart and original local news for Charlotte. We offer free and paid subscription plans. More info here.

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Charlotte’s Aimee Maye was a standout athlete long before the Maye boys became stars — and she shaped far more than their athletic talent

Aimee Maye (center) on family vacation two decades ago with (from left to right) sons Cole, 7; Luke, 8; Beau, 4; husband Mark and son Drake, 2. (Photo courtesy of Aimee Maye)

by Carroll Walton

Ask Charlotte’s own Drake Maye, Super Bowl-bound quarterback for the New England Patriots, who the best athlete in his famously talented family is, and chances are, he will say his mom.

That’s over his brother Luke, who hit the buzzer-beater against Kentucky to send the Tar Heels to the 2017 Final Four; his brother Beau, who walked on the UNC basketball team, too; his brother Cole, who won a College World Series at Florida; and their dad, Mark Maye, a local football legend who starred at Independence and UNC.

Aimee (pronounced A-May) Sockwell Maye was a 6-foot Mecklenburg County basketball player of the year at West Charlotte High, who turned down scholarship offers from Georgia Tech, Richmond and Northwestern to attend UNC, where she met Mark.

If you ask Aimee about Drake’s usual answer to the best-athlete question — say, over burrito bowls at Taco Mama in Dilworth just days before Super Bowl LX — she’ll shrug and say: “That’s the easiest answer.”

She meant that it keeps him out of trouble with his siblings, but her answer also made a larger point. Not only does Drake get athletic gifts from his mother, but humility, too.