Anterio Thompson Makes Pre-Draft Case to Seahawks After Climbing College Ladder

Anterio Thompson spent most of his college career proving doubters wrong. Now he is making one final push to hear his name called on draft weekend.

The former Washington Huskies defensive tackle took a pre-draft visit this week with the Seattle Seahawks at the Virginia Mason Athletic Center, according to sources familiar with the visit. The 6-foot-4, 310-pound Thompson becomes the latest UW prospect to draw local interest as the April 23-25 draft approaches.

Born in Madison, Wisconsin — the same state Seahawks general manager John Schneider calls home — Thompson arrives with a winding path that reads like a survival story. After earning first-team all-conference honors at Hempstead High in Dubuque, Iowa, Thompson was forced to take the junior college route. That detour led to a national championship at Iowa Western Community College before his first FBS opportunity came at Iowa.

His debut in the Big Ten was humbling. Despite blocking two punts for the Hawkeyes, Thompson appeared in just seven games, logging minimal defensive snaps. The experience taught him something valuable: adversity was just another opponent.

Thompson found his footing at Western Michigan, where he started 12 games and finished eighth on the team with 34 tackles. That showing earned him another shot — this time at Washington, where he immediately became a fixture.

In his lone season with the Huskies, Thompson played all 13 games and started three, accumulating 397 defensive snaps — the third-most among UW defensive linemen. His Pro Football Focus grade of 76.0 ranked third on the entire defense, a testament to his consistency against top competition.

At Washington's Pro Day last month, Thompson put up 30 reps of 225 pounds on the bench press, a number sure to catch attention from scouts still evaluating his ceiling. His stock has been climbing steadily since the coaching staff at UW gave him a second chance he refused to waste.

Thompson joins running back Jonah Coleman as the only publicly known UW prospects to visit the Seahawks this cycle. Whether the late attention translates to a draft-day selection or an undrafted free agent opportunity remains to be seen.

The Badger State native has shown a habit throughout his career of making the most of moments when others count him out.