Marshall's Antonio Washington Celebrates Birthday With Defensive MVP Title At Combine

TYLER -- It was one heck of a 17th birthday for Antonio Washington at the Accelerated Performance Enhancement Center's brand new location in Tyler.

Marshall's standout defensive tackle kicked off the pivotal summer period of recruiting Sunday with the Defensive Most Valuable Player Award at the third annual ETSN.fm + APEC Football Recruiting Combine presented by Azalea Orthopedics. He also won the defensive line positional group title by default.

"It was a big thing I had been looking forward to all year," Washington, a rising senior, said. "Then, another thing, it was my birthday. I said, 'Let's go get a W on my birthday,' and that's what I came out and did."

Washington (6-0, 260) recorded 4,444 watts on the Keiser squat machine during the test phase of the event. That's a number even defensive line peers training for the NFL struggle to reach, according to APEC founder and director Bobby Stroupe.

He also ran a 5.13 second laster-timed 40, recorded a 4.56 pro agility time and got up 16 reps of 225 pounds on the bench press during the process.

It wasn't all numbers though.

Washington shined in one-on-one drills against elite regional competition. He faced Arp offensive lineman Jeremy West, a Chapel Hill transfer, during the process as well as Athens offensive lineman John West multiple times.

Jeremy West won Offensive Line Most Valuable Player and John West was an honorable mention.

"He dominated one-on-ones," Stroupe said. "Unfortunately, I was on the other end of that a couple of times behind the offensive linemen. He was an incredible force today, setting a record only two of our NFL guys have touched. I think that's a pretty amazing feat.

"He's got a lot of growth he can do and has a lot of room for improvement on some of his technique. But he's got some real gifts and he's just a well-rounded defensive linemen. He's going to be a good player."

Washington helped guide the Mavericks to the area round of the Class 5A Division II playoffs last season. The team fell to Dallas South Oak Cliff after eliminating a solid Nacogdoches team.

Five other Marshall players attended the event. Each performed well.

"The first year I was on varsity, we got a new coach and went to the first round," Washington said. "The second year, we stopped at the second round. The goal is to reach the third round and then keep on going."

A separate goal is to crack the NCAA Division I college football ranks. He currently has zero offers.

Performances like Sunday's should help.

Baylor, North Texas, TCU and Texas Tech have solid dates to visit the East Texas area next month. A handful of other schools will either travel to the area or extend open invitations to evaluation camps on their own campuses.

"I wanted to come out to the combine to show what I've got," Washington said. "This motivates me to go out there and keep on grinding."