Matt Mottes

Following their dominating 1st round win over No. 7 Southmoreland, the No. 7 Hopewell Vikings have a much more difficult opponent next.

Friday night, the Vikings will travel to take on No. 2 seed and undefeated Imani Christian. All season; Imani has been ranked No. 2 in Class AAA behind undefeated Avonworth.

Because they are the No. 2 seed, IC had a bye in first round of the playoffs.

There’s no way getting around it, this team is legit and full of not only talent but D-1 football talent.  In fact, their two most talented players are 2027 4-star quarterback/defensive back Gabriel Jackson and 2026 4-star athlete David Davis. Both of those players were committed to Penn State but then opened up their recruitment following the firing of James Franklin.

It goes beyond those two players, as they have a handful of other players with D-1 scholarship offers.

During the regular season, Imani Christian outscored their opponents 476 to 66.

The task will be tall, but Hopewell will be ready and will be looking to do what many people feel isn’t possible.

For the first time in 13 years, the Hopewell HS football team will compete in the WPIAL playoffs.

HC Matt Mottes and his squad will get on the bus and take the long ride to Russ Grimm Field to take on the Southmoreland Scotties. Hopewell enters as the No. 10 seed, while Southmoreland enters as No. 7.

Southmoreland finished the regular season with a record of 9-1, which was good for second place in the Interstate Conference.

The Scotties lone loss was to 1st place Elizabeth Forward (42-0) with their wins coming against Valley (42-0), East Allegheny (49-7), Laurel Highlands (54-7), Blackhawk (24-17), Ringgold (28-7), Derry (23-11), Yough (41-0), Mt. Pleasant (14-0) and Greensburg Salem (38-0).

Southmoreland has a first-year head coach 24-year-old head coach Dustin Shoaf and started the season 8-0, which was their best start to a season since 1964.

Southmoreland’s offense centers around junior quarterback Dawson Wolfe and junior running back Jackson Mickens. Wolfe has passed for nearly 1,000 yards and 11 touchdowns, while also rushing for 280 yards and 7 touchdowns. Mickens has rushed for close to 500 yards and a team-high 10 TDs.

With all that being said, aside from Elizabeth Forward, Southmoreland hasn’t faced a team with the talent and playmakers that they’ll face tomorrow night.

Is sophomore quarterback James Armstrong 100% healthy? No, but he’s better than he was two weeks ago and I truly believe this offense will have one of those games where they won’t have a problem moving the ball.

This Hopewell team is hungry, especially these seniors, who have been working to play in a game like this for 4+ years.

Tomorrow night is the night and they’ll be ready.

PREDICTION- HOPEWELL 45 SOUTHMORELAND 20

Football is the ultimate team sport. You can have a couple star players but unless you have a ROSTER full of talent and team players, you’ll fall short.

To the credit of the players and coaches on this 2025 Hopewell Vikings football team, despite the mountains of adversity they’ve faced, they got through it and completed their best season in 13 years.

The biggest reason for the team success is the players adopted the ‘Next Man Up Mentality’.

Trust me, with the number of injuries and other issues this team has had to deal with, it’s been a must.

It started towards the start of training camp when Hopewell standout safety Julian Baldwin suffered a broken leg, which sidelined him until the last game of the season. Baldwin was the quarterback on the defense in terms of play calling and getting his teammates set, so that was obviously a big loss.

After that, standout sophomore Brody Rock suffered a freak accident on his scooter which kept him out for over half the season and he’s still on a bit of a ‘pitch count’ in terms of game action. In his freshman season, Rock was a punishing running back, along with a reliable pass-catching target for James Armstrong. Defensively, he developed into a reliable sideline to sideline middle linebacker. Because of the injury, Rock has just played on offense this season.

The adversity didn’t stop there was standout defensive lineman Brian McCabe was impacted by a shoulder injury, Armstrong is still dealing with an ankle injury, running back Nasir Wade (lower body injury) and most recently, senior Kingston Krotec suffered an injury on the first play of the Central Valley game that will sideline him for the rest of the season, plus star defensive tackle Keith Young was also sidelined for a portion of the year.

That’s not to mention injuries to other players that forced them to miss a game or didn’t allow them to be 100% during the game.

Despite all of that, Hopewell finished the season 6-4 and are preparing to take on Southmoreland this Friday in the 1st round of the WPIAL playoffs.

“As you know, we missed Keith Young for part of the season and Richie Johns and Landon Matthews were able to step up there,” HC Matt Mottes tells Vikings Sports Now. “As you know, James (Armstrong) has been playing hurt now for a couple of weeks. With that, Nasir (Wade) has really stepped up and carried the load with 20 carries against Central Valley and then he got banged up this past Friday against North Catholic. We lost Julian Baldwin for pretty much the entire season. He recently came back but he’s really not 100%. Because of that, we moved Josh Brunton and Vinny Borris, kids that will pretty much do anything for the team, to different positions. We moved Josh to safety and then Borris and Michael Gargiulo covering the other corner for us.”

“We were really banged up the last couple of weeks, and I would’ve liked to win those last two games but everyone on this roster has stepped up and have done what’s been asked of them. We were respectable the last couple of weeks, our kids played hard, fought through adversity and here we are in the playoffs for the first time since 2012 when a lot of these kids were still in diapers.”

While the players certainly deserve credit, don’t shortchange the Vikings coaching staff. Week after week, they’ve had to 1) evaluate who’s healthy enough to play 2) rotate players or decide on who to move into the starting lineup 3) come up with a gameplan that best fits who’s available that week.

“Once you think you have it figured out, who have to go back to the drawing board,” said Mottes. “You get one kid back from injury and then you lose another one. The nice thing is that we are getting some kids back, but this season has definitely challenged our depth. It’s been nice to see we have that depth where we’ve been able to plug people in. However, it would be nice to have your starters there for every single play and see what we can do with a healthy team.”

The Vikings coaches and players have been preparing and coming up with a game plan since Saturday afternoon to try and defeat 9-1 Southmoreland.

Mottes and his program achieved one of their preseason goals, which was to make the playoffs. Now the next goal to reach is to win a playoff game. Regardless, Matt is excited for what his players have achieved and hopes this is just the first of many playoff games he’s preparing for as head coach at Hopewell.

“It’s nice when all the people in the community, all the text messages, all the phone calls I’ve received from county commissioners, county row officers, local politicians, people I grew up with, people I haven’t talked to in 20 years sending me messages congratulating me for putting Hopewell football back on the map,” said Mottes. “Then you reflect a bit and realistically, we’re a few plays away from being 8-2 or 9-1. But this is where we’re at, 6-4 and honestly, I think we’re in a pretty good spot heading into the playoffs. I like our chances in our 1st round matchup, and we’ll see how far we can go, hopefully all the way to Heinz Field. ”

From his successful playing days at Aliquippa and has an assistant coach with various programs, this isn’t Mottes first playoff rodeo. Because of that, it’s certainly not about him and you can truly tell that he’s excited the most that this group of seniors will be able to experience playing in a playoff football game for the first time at Hopewell.

“I explained to them last year that when you truly start believing in yourself that you’re going to be dangerous. These kids have truly bought in and have played to the end in every game. They never stop; they never quit. In years past and I know you’ve seen it, for example, in a game like last year against Beaver. It’s 7-7 in the 2nd quarter, a couple of things go wrong, and the wheels fall off the bus for these kids. But that’s not the case anymore. We’ll battle you to the end. We might not always win but our opponents know that they’re going to be in a game. This year against Beaver, they scored a late touchdown with 2 minutes left in the game. But we responded. My kids went down the field in our 2-minute drill and scored with a few seconds left. We wanted to win and went for two to win it. It didn’t work out but that was an example of our kids fighting and not giving up.”

“These seniors, remember, this is a group that lost 95-0 in Pee Wee football. The amount of adversity that they’ve faced; from Kingston breaking his ankle last year, JB breaking his leg this year. Nobody believing that they were any good, winning one game as a sophomore. Now we have an opportunity to take a business trip down to Southmoreland, play a very good football team and have an opportunity to advance in the playoffs. We’re finally playing meaningful football at the end of October.”

Looking to hire a head coach, regardless of the level of the sport, is never an easy thing.

Factors such as salary, NIL fund, expectations of the fan base, expectations of the organization, school boards, input of parent, you name it, they all can factor into who will apply for the job and ultimately who gets hired.

A couple of years ago, the Hopewell School District was at a real crossroads in terms of their football program and whether or not they were going to take the sport serious.

I’ll be brutally honest; the Hopewell football program was a complete mess and getting worse by the day.

The size of the roster was declining for various reasons but mostly because of how non-competitive the team was. Who wants to go out for a sport, train nearly year-round and get slaughtered out on the field each Friday night? I remember going to a game not too long ago and counting 25+ players on the Hopewell sideline.

That was embarrassing and so were their records.

From 2013 until 2023, Hopewell’s football record was 22-80.   Yes, 22-80. In 8 of those 11 seasons, the Vikings won 2 games or less. Do you blame kids for not wanting to come out for football?

Following the 2023 season, Hopewell found themselves in the market for a coach again and originally hired veteran head coach and Hopewell native John Rosa to take over the program. However, a tremendous opportunity presented itself, which Rosa was smart to accept which meant the district was back at square one.

The Rosa news happened late in the process, so the pressure was really on Hopewell superintendent Jeff Beltz and the school board. A few candidates applied, mostly with little to none head coaching experience including Matt Mottes.

Which direction would the board go?

Hopewell HC Matt Mottes

Mottes was in-line to be Hopewell’s defensive coordinator under Rosa but was approached by a couple people about applying for the job. The players currently on the team had been working out with Mottes and the rest of the coaches so he wouldn’t be a completely new face and would be able to implement some of Rosa’s ideas and system they had been working on.

However, Mottes was hesitant at first because of factors such as never being a head coach, his full-time job and the fact that he had just become a dad for the first time, which is obviously a job in itself and a life-changing experience.

But after consulting with a number of people, including his wife Jenny, Mottes decided to apply for the vacancy.

Coach Mottes and Family

The question now was what would the Hopewell School Board decide to do? Luckily for Hopewell football and its players, they hired Mottes as the interim coach for the 2024 season. Cudos to the board members for that program changing decision.

After showing progress by going 4-6 last year, Mottes was named the full-time coach this past offseason.

Heading into this Friday’s game against Central Valley, Hopewell has a record of 6-2 and battling for their first WPIAL playoff berth since 2012. Friday’s win over Freeport assured the Vikings of their first winning season since 2011.

But really, it goes beyond just wins and losses.

Mottes and his talented coaching staff have created a new culture for the football program. Excuses, selfishness, and quite frankly bullshit will not be tolerated by anyone. Personally, I’ve witnessed Mottes and other coaches address the best players on the roster in let’s call it a stern tone (LOL). Regardless of if you’re a starter or a 3rd team player, if you’re not performing or behaving to the standards and expectations of Hopewell football, you will hear about it, and it will be addressed. PERIOD.

If you truly want to change things, that’s the way things must be handled and if it ruffles some feathers and even causes some to leave, so be it.

Over the last two years, I’ve come to learn that Mottes is a coach that cares for his players, will do whatever it takes to help them and is a guy they enjoy being around. However, when a loud voice is needed, when certain things need to change and discipline needs enforced, he’s up to the task.

The Standard is the Standard.

Because of this, because of a lot of dedication from the players and coaches and because of player development, football is an event once again on Friday nights in Hopewell. More and more people are coming to Tony Dorsett Stadium on Friday nights, which is tremendous to see. Two Fridays against McGuffey, the home stands were as filled as I’ve seen them in many years and with the importance of this Friday’s game against Central Valley, the stadium will be filled to capacity.

Tons of people in the stands is not only exciting for the team but also good for business as the concession stands are jammed with people and making money.

This winning and excitement also gets kids to want to come out for football as the high school roster this year is at 52 players. That’s also trickled down to the junior high program, which started the season with 41 players.

The buzz for Hopewell football will climb to another level if this team is able to qualify for the playoffs this year. That would be a tremendous accomplishment and moment for this team; especially for the seniors on this roster, who endured plenty of struggles and losing in their freshman and sophomore years.

With the young talent on this roster and in the system, this success isn’t going to be a one-year thing.

Get used to it because Hopewell football is back and it all started with the hiring of Mottes as head coach.

The Hopewell Vikings football team will be looking to start the season 2-0 for the first time since 2016 tomorrow night when they host New Castle.

This doesn’t look to be an easy assignment as New Castle defeated Hopewell last season 42-19 and are coming off a 13-0 shutout of Penn Hills last Friday.

In the latest rankings, WPIAL Insider has New Castle ranked as the No. 16 overall team in the entire WPIAL so the Vikings will have their hands full.

This afternoon, Vikings Sports Now had the chance to talk with Vikings HC Matt Mottes about this week’s opponent and also took a quick look back at last Friday’s season-opening win, 56-0 win over Riverside.

While they may not want it or feel like they deserve it, attention and expectations will be with the 2025 Hopewell Vikings Football team.

Coach Matt Mottes has always liked to be with teams that fly under the radar, but Hopewell won’t be afforded that luxury. Despite only winning 4 games last season and not making the playoffs in 12 years, Hopewell will enter this season as a highly ranked team.

This morning, the Tribune Review released their WPIAL Preseason High School Football rankings.  Fame.

Taking a look at his Class 3A preseason Top 5, the Trib’s Paul Schofield likes what he sees with Hopewell as he’s placed them in his Top 5, at No. 3.

TRIBUNE REVIEW PRESEASON CLASS 3A TOP 5 TEAMS

1) Avonworth

2) Imani Christian

3) HOPEWELL

4) Elizabeth Forward

5) Central Valley

That’s quite a bullseye on the back of Hopewell but it’s never a bad thing when you’re viewed as a good team. I’m sure Coach Mottes and the coaching staff will use this as motivation.

Hopewell opens the season on Friday at Riverside before returning home the following week to host New Castle in a non-conference game, which will be challenging. After hosting Ambridge, Hopewell will then have two extremely difficult back-to-back games against Beaver and on the road at Avonworth.

The middle of the schedule will consist of games with Quaker Valley, McGuffey and Freeport before ending the season against Central Valley and North Catholic.

As the high school football season gets closer, Vikings Sports Now continues with our position-by-position preview of the 2025 Hopewell Vikings.

Earlier in the week, we gave a little preview of the Vikings defensive line and linebackers, so today, we’ll take a look at the secondary.

With the way offenses have evolved and rely heavily on their passing games, Hopewell’s ability to defend the pass and prevent big plays down the field will be important.

The encouraging thing is that Hopewell’s secondary will return many players from last season and have also added a huge talent.

Earlier in the summer, VSN told you about the awful news of senior defensive back Julian Baldwin breaking his leg, which will force him to miss the entire season.

Baldwin was the ‘quarterback’ and vocal leader of the secondary, making all of the calls, so someone will need to step up to do that.

This is no doubt an unfortunate loss, but Hopewell returns a lot of talent and will have to employee the ‘next man up’ mentality.

VSN was able to talk with Hopewell HC Matt Mottes about some of the players he’ll be relying on in the secondary this season.

While Hopewell will be down Baldwin, they will be getting back a player that missed all of last season with a broken ankle in senior Kingston Krotec. Throughout his high school career, Krotec has been a quarterback but that will change this season as he’ll play on both sides of the ball, at safety and wide receiver.

“Having Kingston back this season will be huge for us,” said Mottes. “We missed him a lot last year and with his injury, we threw James (Armstrong) into the fire, which he responded pretty well. This year, I expect Kingston to play a lot on both sides of the ball. I’ve said this time and time again; he’s one of the best athletes on our team. I’m excited to see what he does this year.”

Like with DL Keith Young (transfer from Keystone Oaks), the addition of sophomore Nasir Wade (transfer from Aliquippa) will be a huge impact on both sides of the ball. Wade is a player with tremendous speed and will be someone that will make a ton of plays on both sides of the ball. It’s not an exaggeration to say that he’s a threat to go the distance every time he touches the ball. Despite just starting his sophomore season, Wade already holds two D-1 offers.

Hopewell’s Nasir Wade and James Armstrong

“Adding Nasir Wade at safety, I think will be a really big help for us,” said Mottes. “Nasir is someone with a very high football IQ. He breaks on the ball extremely well and looks great when he does it. He’s someone that’s able to see a play as it’s developing. So far, I’ve really liked what I’ve seen from him.”

As far as the rest of the Hopewell secondary, the biggest strength that they appear to have is depth.

“With Julian being out for most of the season, we’re going to have a void there but having a returning starter like Josh Brunton is going to be big, because he’ll step up. Mike Gargiulo, a kid that came out late last year, is going to be a senior this year and I expect big things out of him. Vinny Boris is our utility man and is able to do whatever we ask of him. He’s a kid that always works hard and I expect him to be on the field as a defensive back as well. Another player that I haven’t brought up yet is Brian Olden; he’s a gifted young player that I believe can compete at a high level as long as he stays focused.”

“Like we have upfront, I believe we’ll have a constant rotation of depth,” said Mottes. “A lot of coaches would give anything to have 20 to 25 kids that are capable of playing on a Friday night.”

On Tuesday, Vikings Sports Now started our look at each position on the Hopewell Vikings 2025 football team by looking at the defensive line.

With the likes of Keith Young, Brian McCabe, Nick Thomas, Aris Haniotes, etc. the defensive line will be one of if not the deepest position on the team.

By having such a productive defensive line, the other parts of the defensive will no doubt benefit. If the guys up front can get to the quarterback or at least pressure them, that will mean less time that the defensive backs have to stay with the wide receivers.

The other guys on defense that will benefit from a strong defensive line are the Hopewell linebackers. With the opposing offensive line working to matchup up with the DL, the Viking linebackers will have more room to find space to attack the opposing quarterback and running backs.

During our recent conversation, Hopewell HC Matt Mottes went over some of the names you’ll see at the linebacker position.

“We have Justin Obeldobel returning, we have Zander Muzy returning,” said Coach Mottes. “Zander led the linebackers in sacks last year and also had two defensive touchdowns. We’ve added George Tafkov (from Keystone Oaks).  I’ve hoping that Grant Houy can do some things for us this year. He’s actually one of our best tacklers.”

“We’ve been flirting with the idea of maybe moving Avery Bokor down to outside linebacker. Avery has gained some nice size over the off-season and with his speed, size and toughness, I think he can be an asset at linebacker for us. Anytime you can return nine defensive starters returning, it’s always a good thing.”

Hopewell will take on Ellwood City in a scrimmage on August 16th, followed by the season opener at Riverside on August 22nd. The 2025 Home Opener will take place on August 29th against New Castle.