TAMPA, Fla. – Antonio Turner excelled at baseball and football through high school in Tacoma, Wash. He ultimately decided football was going to be his sport in college. Not that he had designs on becoming an NFL draft pick. Rather, he felt the highest level of college football with which he could perform to the fullest was Division II. Nothing wrong with that.
“I am not a very big guy, wasn’t a very strong guy, wasn’t a very fast guy,” said the first-year head of strength and conditioning at USF, who was listed at 5-foot-6 and 165 pounds during his senior season at Malone University in Canton, Ohio. “But I played hard.”
Turner committed to a school more than 2,000 miles away from home for the opportunity to play for an institution that offered a competitive level of football while further developing his faith at a strong academic Christian university.
“The opportunity to play at the highest level I could and to develop my faith in a football world was huge,” he said. “Some of the best relationships I have had over the course of my life are because of Malone.”
Turner’s senior season and 18-game playing career came to an end when he tore an ACL returning a kick in the 2014 opener. Off the gridiron, his passion for sports and athletic performance provided the path to graduating in the spring of 2015 with a bachelor’s in kinesiology and exercise science.
“I had a heart for developing people to be the best version of themselves,” said the 32-year-old.
Through college, Turner kept in touch with a buddy in Tacoma who had a strength training background and provided direction in how to go about procuring internships and other opportunities. During his senior year at Malone, Turner interviewed with at least 10 schools, most of them in Ohio. Neither of them came through, though an internship at Mississippi State did.
After connecting with the Bulldogs’ assistant strength and conditioning coach, Brady Collins, who is now at Wisconsin, Turner made the 12-hour drive south from one campus to another and did it straight through.
“(Collins) told me it was going to be the best internship experience I will ever have,” he recalled. “I drove down there and slept in my car. I just wanted to get down there and I fell in love with the place.”
Turner returned to Malone to finish up his classwork. He went home to Tacoma following graduation and packed up his car once again so he and his father could make the drive to Starkville.
“It was Dak Prescott’s senior year,” exclaimed Turner, who became a first-time father in May.
The internship led to positions at Maryland, Iowa State, Florida, UMass, back in Mississippi at Ole Miss and then returning to Ohio at Ohio State where Turner became the associate head strength and conditioning coach for three years under Mickey Marotti. It was in Columbus that he built a relationship with Brian Hartline, the Buckeyes’ offensive coordinator. That bond led to yet another opportunity.
“I’m in the middle of training players and (Hartline’s) like, ‘Let me talk to you really quick,’” he said, recalling what took place in the Buckeyes’ weight room last December. “So, in the middle of training I just left my dudes right there, which you’re probably not supposed to do, but I did. We walked into coach Mick’s office and (Hartline) said he just got the South Florida job and he wanted to know if I was interested in coming. I said, ‘Absolutely. Fire me up. I’m ready to roll.’”
Hartline remained the offensive coordinator for the playoff-bound Buckeyes until their season was complete. Alas, he had a staff to hire and he knew what he was getting in Turner.
“You know what you are going to get every day,” said Hartline, praising Turner’s consistency in dealing with people. “Our head strength coach and his staff handle our players more than the coaches do, so the reflection on them is real. I am really proud of where he is at, really proud that he is a new dad, too. ‘AT’ is doing a great job and I can’t thank that guy enough.”
Several players have had nothing but good things to say about Turner’s ability to not only get the most out of them, but the visual results. Even if the decibel level has a tendency to rise.
“He’s a loud guy and he’s high in energy,” said defensive back Tavin Ward, who is in his fifth season with the Bulls. “When he’s in the room, you know he’s in the room. The transformation we went through from before summer to (before preseason camp), and then to compare from pictures we took is ridiculous.”
Including the internship at Mississippi State, USF is Turner’s eighth university of employ in 11 years since he graduated Malone. He got something out of each stop along the way and processed every bit of information he could so that he could build his career. He has nothing but praise for each of the strength coaches he worked with along the way, and no experience was more valuable than at Ohio State.
“I’m a byproduct of the strength coaches that have come before me,” he said. “Working for coach Mick the last three years in Columbus prepared me for this opportunity. I would not have been ready for this opportunity if it were not for him.”
READ: Faith In Numbers: Why USF’s C.J. Hicks Wears No. 1
Please make a small donation to the Tampa Free Press to help sustain independent journalism. Your contribution enables us to continue delivering high-quality, local, and national news coverage.
Sign up: Subscribe to our free newsletter for a curated selection of top stories delivered straight to your inbox.
