John Matthews won a gold medal at the 1975 Pan American Games in the coxed pairs, also competing that year at the World Championships in the same boat. Matthews attended Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) in Massachusetts, graduating as a civil engineer in 1974. He later worked at WPI for almost 20 years before moving to the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, where he was in charge of design and construction management as the assistant director for campus projects. Matthews continued to compete in masters rowing into his 60s.