Hi-Line Athlete Profile: Matt Weber, MSU-N Wrestling

Former four-time state champion Matt Weber ready to add a national title with the Lights to the family trophy case

The Montana State University-Northern wrestling program is used to winning, and so is the Weber family, including Matt, one of two brothers currently wrestling for the Lights.

Soon though, the Lights will add another Weber to their midst, as the youngest brother Nathan will join Matt, a junior and Brandon, a redshirt junior, who is also the reigning NAIA national champion at 157 pounds.

Yes, the Weber's have quite a tradition when it comes to winning on the mat. Before coming to Northern to wrestle, Brandon Weber was a three-time state champion and four-time placer at the state wrestling tournament, while competing for Forsyth. Matt, who also wrestled at Forsyth, was a four-time state champion in high school. The youngest brother, Nathan, also has one state championship and will be shooting for a second this February.

If he succeeds, that will raise the total number of Montana state championships among the three brothers to nine. Yet, like his older brother, Brandon, Matt Weber, who already earned NAIA All-American honors as a freshman in 2016, has much higher goals.

"I am setting my goals on being a national champion," Matt Weber said. "I want to follow in Brandon's footsteps."

After getting his career off to a stellar start back in 2016, finishing third at the NAIA national tournament, as well as placing in five other tournaments, it looked like the sky was the limit for Weber. As a freshman, he even knocked off multiple competitors that were ranked No. 1 in the country in the NAIA.

Certainly, after a performance like that, he was expected to contend for a national title and while he performed well at the national championships, he came up just one win shy of becoming an All-American for the second straight season.

However, one thing that held back Weber was an injury that sidelined him for most of the fall during the 2016-17 campaign. He still rebounded to post a 19-10 record in the spring semester and finished in the top three on three different occasions at tournaments, but still he wasn't quite the same.

"I came back kind of slow last year," Weber said of his injury. "But that's wrestling. I feel like I am coming along a lot better this season."

Now, Weber is fully recovered, although he has missed a few tournaments this season. But when he has been on the mat, he has wrestled well so far, posting an 11-3 record. In dual competition, he has just one loss and has racked up numerous pins.

Yet starting this week, Weber and the Lights are starting the home stretch of their 2017-18 season. Northern will resume its schedule after taking a few weeks off for the holiday break, with a home dual against Southern Oregon Thursday night at the Armory Gymnasium.

After that, Northern will head to Dickinson, North Dakota, for the Dickinson State duals and the Tyler Plummer Classic. Those events are Jan. 12 and 13. Then, the Lights will return home for duals with Embry Riddle, Feb. 3, and the University of Providence, which invades the Armory Feb. 7. That signals the end of the regular-season schedule for the Lights, who will then head to the West National Qualifier in Ashland, Oregon, Feb. 17.

Weber, who has made the NAIA national tournament the past two seasons, will look to lock up his third appearance at the meet, which will be held March 2-3 in Des Moines, Iowa. But before Matt and the Lights look too far ahead, they have to battle Southern Oregon Thursday and leading up to that, the Havre Daily News caught up with Weber for five questions.

HDN: Your younger brother recently signed to wrestle at Northern. How does it feel having all three of you in the program starting next season?

Weber: "It's pretty sweet, especially because he never got to wrestle with Brandon in high school. So now he will get the chance to wrestle with all of us."

HDN: When he was considering Northern, what kind of advice did you give him or what role did you play?

Weber: "I just told him about the family atmosphere that we have here at Northern that Tyson (Thivierge) has worked really hard to create."

HDN: How do you feel your season is going so far?

Weber: "I think that it's going well. There is definitely a lot of room for improvement. So that's every day, working every day in practice trying to get better."

HDN: What do you like most about wrestling for Northern?

Weber: "The teammates and coaches. We definitely spend a lot of time together on the road and in the practice room, so it's definitely those guys that make it worthwhile."

HDN: You said your goal is to win a national championship. What do you think you need to do to achieve that goal?

Weber: "Well, I started kind of slow coming back last year. But that's just wrestling. I feel like I am coming back stronger this year. I think, right now, there is a lot of season left and I am just trying to take it one match at a time."