Matt Wrather Chosen as a Semifinal for 2024 William V. Campbell Trophy®

9/26/2024 3:45:00 PM | By: Jack Stephens, Staff Writer

IRVING, Texas — The National Football Federation & College Football Hall of Fame announced over 200 semifinalists for their most prestigious scholar-athlete award, the William V. Campbell Award. For the second straight year, John Carroll is represented by an outstanding "Man of Carroll".

Senior offensive lineman Matt Wrather is the man to do it, being one of 44 Division III football players to reach this prestigious mark. Wrather joins 203 other football players over all college football.

Wrather has been the anchor of a dominant Blue Streak front for the last three seasons. A two time All-OAC First Team and D3Football.com All Region First Team honoree, a year ago the Olentangy Liberty product finished as a D3Football.com All-American Second Teamer and the OAC Ken Wable Co-Offensive Lineman of the Year.

Full NFF release

To go along with his All-American level of play on the gridiron, he has shown tremendous selflessness and service.

Entering this school year, the All-American has done approximately 260 hours of service toward his hometown community in Columbus and the John Carroll community of University Heights.

His biggest contribution has been through JCU's Jesuit Day of Service. He was a member of the core team last spring, where he helped organize 350+ JCU community members from 40+ organizations, teams and on-campus groups around Cleveland. Wrather was a student leader of a group of around 90 volunteers supporting the Fatima Family Center, a local non-profit community center, in cleaning up their facility.

The senior also co-founded the John Carroll University Student Alumni Association, aiming to close the gap between active students and alumni. His team recruited over 200 alumni and 150 students and hosted seven events over the last year.

The leader of the JCU offense joins this exclusive club of football legends and Pro Bowlers including Peyton Manning, Tim Tebow, Christian Wilkens and Justin Herbert as semi-finalist for this prestigious honor. As previously mentioned, Weather is the second Blue Streak in as many years to be a semifinalist for this award. Former teammate Bricker Thiel garnered the honor last year before going on to win the OAC's Clyde Lamb Award.

An all-time great career in only two seasons so far, the leader of the offensive line has once again been an outstanding player on the field and an outstanding person off of the field. Continue to watch for Wrather to be a force in the trenches on the field and a tremendous role model off of the gridiron.

According to the NFF release: "The NFF will announce 12-14 finalists on Oct. 23, and each of them will receive an $18,000 postgraduate scholarship as a member of the 2024 NFF National Scholar-Athlete Class Presented by Fidelity Investments. The finalists will travel to the Bellagio Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas for the 66th NFF Annual Awards Dinner Presented by Las Vegas on Dec. 10, where their accomplishments will be highlighted in front of one of the most powerful audiences in all of sports. Live during the event, one member of the class will be declared as the winner of the 35th Campbell Trophy® and have his postgraduate scholarship increased to $25,000."

The Blue Streak football team hosts their first home game at Don Shula Stadium this Saturday, as they look to grab their first win of the season against the Heidelberg Student Princes at 1:30 pm.

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