Ashton Washington, High School Football Recruiting Analyst
Ashton Washington on the Set of ESPN
As most of you know we here at D1 Highlights pride ourselves on highlighting the positive football players, coaches and programs in the state of Tennessee. As we have grown over the past few years we also have a new-found mission to help high school and college students looking to get into the world of sports journalism by offering internships in the field. With that new-found mission in mind we want to shed some light on a young lady based out of Austin Texas making huge strides to fulfill her dream to work in sports journalism after she finishes college at Huston-Tillotson University.
Ashton Washington was born in Columbus, Mississippi and raised in Houston Texas where she attended Fort Bend Travis High School. Ashton has always been surrounded by sports, her grandfather was the women’s basketball coach at Mary Holmes College in West Point, MS and her cousin, Josh Dobbs…well, we all know what he has done in his career! If you don’t then you need to crawl out from under your rock.
There are plenty of young people that want to achieve a certain goal in life but very few of them that make the early sacrifices and take the steps necessary to make that goal happen. The thing that caught our eye about Ashton is that she is definitely making not just steps towards her goal but huge strides towards being a sports journalist. Currently while attending college full-time Ashton is also serving as a member of the Campus Connection Program for ESPNU and working an internship for Rivals.com as a sports analyst. Her main focus is on the University of Houston football recruits, news regarding Coach Applewhite and the team as a whole. Ashton tells us that the best part of her current roles is being able to go out and cover local high school teams, players and programs in Texas. “Nothing is more inspiring than helping these young athletes succeed in what they love while doing what I love”.
Recently Ashton was able to meet our longtime friend Buck Fitzgerald in Houston where his organization NPA was holding its off-season camp workouts at C.E. King High School. Buck and NPA has definitely
Ashton Washington with cousin Josh Dobbs
been a valuable asset to D1 Highlights and we are sure that Ashton will find that NPA’s presence in Texas will be valuable to her as well. We asked Ashton who her influences and role models are in and outside of the industry, she mentioned Josh of course and tells us that not only has he been a great cousin to her but more of an older brother at times. “He’s actually my own personal walking diary, I tell him any and everything that comes to mind. I can definitely say that Josh will always be there by my side throughout my career, guiding me with his words of encouragement, advice, and daily prayer notes. He constantly reminds me that without God nothing is possible”.
Ashton’s poise and drive remind us a lot of Nashville’s very own Dawn Davenport, who we told her to look up and study. Ashton definitely has a bright future, who knows, maybe even with a growing High School Football Media out here in Nashville…hint hint! Follow Ashton @RivalsAshtonW on twitter and @rivalsashtonw on instagram
