New Head Coach Matt Weiss Looking to Restore Once Mighty Hopewell Football Program

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Hopewell High School has a long and proud football tradition with its record books filled with names like Tony Dorsett, Dan Raines, Paul Posluszny, and Rushel Shell, just to name a few.

But that’s all in the past.

The Vikings football program has hit hard times over the last six years as wins have been few and far between. Things went into a downward spiral starting in 2013 and 2014 as they went a combined 1-17, which led to former head coach Dave Vestal leaving the program.

The school then hired Mark Washington, who came from the winning tradition of Aliquippa football but he wasn’t able to make a difference either. In his four seasons, Hopewell had four straight losing seasons and were 6-21 in conference play.

Following the 2018 season, Washington resigned as Hopewell’s head coach and the school hired someone associated with one of the most successful programs in the WPIAL.

Long-time Rochester assistant coach Matt Weiss is now in charge of the Hopewell program, his first opportunity to be a high school head coach.

Pittsburgh Sports Now attended the first practice fall practice for Hopewell on Monday and talked to Weiss about his first head coaching opportunity and the challenge of turning around the once proud Vikings program.