Miami Hurricanes OT commit Jackson Cantwell is an absolute beast. Standing at nearly 6’8” and at 315 lbs, Mario Cristobal can now boast of a prospect who should be a serious cause of worry for his opponents. He’s not just a 5-star OT; he’s a major celebrity in the high school track-and-field scene. With both his parents being Olympians, it’s no wonder Cantwell is the golden boy for Nixa High’s athletics. Ahead of the final year of his prep career, Cantwell just published a high school record, and that too with seamless effort. In fact, with just a little boost, he could’ve held the title of being a national record holder. Based on his latest claim, he seems confident in making another glorious feat in the near future.
Cantwell already has a few records in shot put, including one from when he was just 13 years old. His excellence can be owed a little to his father, Christian Cantwell, who is a World Championship-winning American shot putter. At just 13 years old, Cantwell was already benching 315 pounds—his weight today. His physical prowess helped him rack up 286 pancake blocks, according to MaxPreps. At this year’s MSHSAA state championship, Cantwell broke his own Missouri high school record with a 76-foot, 11 ¼-inch throw. Sadly, he missed out on the national record set by Michael Carter by just 1 centimeter. Imagine that. That record was set in 1979.
Cantwell, however, is not miffed by missing that record. He is US No. 2, after all, with that nearly 77-foot shot. He shared a clip of that monstrous throw on his Instagram page and dropped a major claim in the caption. It read, “The end of the road is coming soon… U20 American record in 3 weeks?”
Cantwell will compete in the Nike Outdoor Nationals this year and is hoping to break the national record there. He already had a goal to be the US no. 2, which he is now, with his record-breaking shot. “I just want to see if I can break the American record, so we’ll see how that goes,” he told Sports Illustrated.
Carter and Cantwell share a similarity in football as well. The former also went on to play gridiron football. Carter played CFB at SMU. He then played for 9 years in the NFL with the San Francisco 49ers, starring as their nose tackle. Carter won 3 Super Bowls in his career and an Olympic medal, too, on the side. In fact, he achieved both these achievements in a single year. And given how close Cantwell came to breaking his record, it’d be no surprise to see a similar trajectory for him as well. After all, he has Olympic-worthy talent in his blood. For a nearly 17-year-old, Cantwell has superhuman-like talent in him.
Jackson Cantwell pulls off a daring stunt at high school
The star OT benching his current weight at just 13 years old was a jaw-dropping fact on its own. However, a clip On3 dropped on Instagram shows the true lengths of his strength. The guy is still in high school and benched a whopping 475 lbs without any of those loud groans and grunts. His father, Christian, was also there to help him, but Cantwell lifted that weight with a close grip, too. Imagine gridiron football’s misfortune if he decides to take his career to a sport he is a master of.
Mario Cristobal being able to score Cantwell gives him another benefit too. He has a trend of producing top-round O-linemen draftees. Cam Robinson, Jonah Williams, Alex Leatherwood, Ryan Kelly, and Penei Sewell all went as 1st or 2nd round picks in their respective drafts. Cantwell, who is already the 2026 class’ overall No. 1 prospect, can easily book a spot for himself among these ranks by the time he becomes eligible for the draft.
The upcoming tournament will be Jackson Cantwell’s last as a high school athlete, and we can surely detect another incoming record for the 5-star athlete. Looking at the way he makes those shots and how far they land, they are just a glimpse of the sheer power that is housed in this beast.
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