WILLIAMSBURG, Va. – D.C. United announced the signing of William & Mary midfielder Antonio Bustamante to a Major League Soccer (MLS) Homegrown Player contract on Monday, Jan. 21. Bustamante becomes the 35th Tribe player to ink a professional contract and the seventh in MLS. He is the 10th player in D.C. United history to sign a Homegrown deal.
 

Bustamante put the wraps on an exceptional career for the Tribe in 2018. He finished among the program's all-time leaders in points (10th at 85), goals (10th at 34), shots (eight at 201) and game-winning goals (12th at 8) while starting 68 of his 69 career appearances.
 
He racked up a long list of notable awards during his Green and Gold career. Bustamante became the first player in state history to be twice named the Virginia Sports Information Directors (VaSID) State Player of the Year, taking home the honor in 2017 and 2018. He was the fifth player in Tribe history to be named to the All-Colonial Athletic Association First Team on three occasions. Bustamante was a three-time United Soccer Coaches All-Region selection, including first team accolades in 2016 and 2017.
 
As a junior, he was named the CAA Player of the Year and was a consensus All-American. Bustamante ranked among the top 10 nationally with 35 points and 15 goals in leading the Tribe to the 2017 CAA Championship. He scored a school-record four goals in the quarterfinal win at Hofstra and added a championship game hat trick against UNCW on his way to the CAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player award. This past season, Bustamante topped the Green and Gold with 15 points and four goals and seven assists. His assist total topped the CAA and ranked among the top 30 nationally in assists per game. 
 
Each of his final two seasons, Bustamante was one of 30 players in the country named to the Missouri Athletic Club Hermann Trophy Watch List. He finished 2017 ranked No. 10 on Top Drawer Soccer's list of the top 100 college soccer players and was ranked as high as No. 5 this past season.
 
Major League Soccer's Homegrown Player Rule, which was created in 2008, allows teams to sign local players from their own development academies directly to MLS first team rosters. Players who join MLS through a club's youth academy for at least one year, and have met the necessary training and retention requirements, can sign a professional contact as a Homegrown Player. This mechanism allows the team to retain its player without subjecting him to the MLS SuperDraft.
 
Bustamante joins legendary Tribe players such as Wade Barrett, Steve Jolley and Adin Brown in the MLS ranks. Barrett won three MLS Cup Championships during his career and was the head coach of the Houston Dynamo in 2016. A first round pick in 1998, he was named to the MLS Best XI and was a finalist for the league's Defender of the Year in 2002. Jolley is the longest tenured Tribe player in MLS, spending 10 seasons with the Los Angeles Galaxy, the New York-New Jersey Metrostars, the Dallas Burn, FC Dallas and Red Bull New York. He was a 2001 MLS All-Star and selected as the U.S. Soccer Foundation Humanitarian of the Year in 2002. Brown, a first-round pick in 2000, spent six seasons in the MLS with the Colorado Rapids, Tampa Bay Mutiny, New England Revolution and Portland Timbers.