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FLW Report
Western Michigan University Wins Abu Garcia College Tournament on Table Rock Lake
The Western Michigan University duo of Joshua Lopez of Kalamazoo, Mich. and John Neubauer of Decatur, Mich. won the Abu Garcia College Fishing presented by YETI at Table Rock Lake.
The duo had a five-bass limit weighing 18 pounds, 5 ounces. The victory earned the Broncos' bass club $2,000 and qualified them to compete in the 2021 FLW College Fishing National Championship.
The Western Michigan team won by a three-ounce margin over the second-place team of Tad Deatherage and Caleb Romazon, University of Central Mo. They had five bass weighing 18 pounds, 3 ounces.
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Hank Cherry Dominates From Start To Finish At 50th Bassmaster Classic
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Across the country, there are thousands of ultra-talented bass anglers who would have loved to compete in this week's 50th Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk.
Only 53 got the opportunity — and from start to finish, there was no doubt which one of them owned the event.
Hank Cherry, a 46-year-old pro from Lincolnton, N.C., and an eight-year veteran of the Bassmaster Elite Series, caught five bass on Championship Sunday that weighed 19 pounds, 8 ounces. It gave him a three-day total of 65-5 and put the exclamation point on a dominant wire-to-wire victory that netted him a $307,500 first-place prize.
The competition was held at historic Lake Guntersville, but Cherry’s raw emotion shined through most back at the final weigh-in, which was held at Legacy Arena inside the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex.
“I talked to (fellow competitor) Paul Mueller in the boatyard, and he told me the devil was gonna try to get in my head today,” Cherry said. “He said just tell the devil to get out of your boat. He said tell him you don’t have time for him.
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Hank Cherry Maintains Solid Lead At Bassmaster Classic On Lake Guntersville
Hank Cherry, of Lincolnton, N.C., is leading after Day 2 of the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk with 45 pounds, 13 ounces. - Photo by Seigo Saito/B.A.S.S
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — If Hank Cherry’s arm is bothering him, it certainly doesn’t show.
The North Carolina veteran pro, who fell and injured his arm in his boat Friday, played through the pain Saturday to catch five bass that weighed 16 pounds, 10 ounces. Added to the 29-3 he caught Friday, it gives him a two-day total of 45-13 that leads the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk
Competition is taking place at Lake Guntersville, and weigh-ins are being held at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex. Cherry’s solid Saturday catch gave him a lead of 4-13 going into Championship Sunday with a $300,000 first-place prize on the line.
“I’m gonna do what I’ve got to do to get this done,” Cherry said. “New fish are still moving into my area. I’ve just got to relax — and if it’s my time, it’s my time.”
Cherry fished the same three baits Saturday that he used to catch his massive bag Friday — a bladed jig, a jerkbait and his own Hank Cherry Signature Series Jig from Picasso. He’s fishing one small area with a causeway and a flat, and he’s done so little running that he hasn’t even had to buy gas for his boat this week.
Now, it’s just a matter of settling down and finishing the job.
“My last thoughts before I go to bed tonight will just be to thank the good Lord for putting me in this position,” said Cherry, who finished third in the 2013 Classic at Grand Lake in Oklahoma. “Then I’ll just get up in the morning ready to go.
“I have to stay relaxed. I have to get that first one in the boat. The first one’s always the roughest one. After that, they start coming.”
The angler closest to Cherry going into the final day is Fayetteville, Tenn., pro Brandon Lester, who caught 20-1 Saturday and jumped from fourth place into second with a two-day mark of 41-0.
Lester started his day with a lipless crankbait and caught a limit early. But since he didn’t have the quality of fish he knew he’d need to win, he made a drastic change.
“There’s this one stretch of boat docks where I’ve caught them before,” Lester said. “I just had a hunch they would be there, so I went there and fished a jig.
“I thought they’d be there, but I didn’t know they would be that big.”
Lester’s catch was anchored by a 6-7 largemouth, as he managed to cull all but one of the original five bass he caught early on the crankbait.
He said plan B has now officially become plan A.
“I didn’t fish that stretch of docks at all (Friday),” Lester said. “I saved it as a backup plan, and I’m glad I did.
“Today, the way the wind was blowing in there, straight out of the north, I could really only fish the back sides of the docks. Hopefully tomorrow, if that wind will kind of lay, I can pick some more off.”
Virginia pro John Crews will start Championship Sunday in third place after catching 16-11 Saturday and pushing his total to 38-3.
“I had to change gears today,” Crews said. “The first few areas I went to where I caught some (Friday) … they just weren’t there. I don’t know if it was the wrong time or whatever, but I didn’t have a bite.
“I just kept moving, kept fishing — and luckily, I was able to put together a decent limit.”
Crews said he his game plan for Sunday would likely be a last-minute thing.
“I honestly don’t have any idea what I’m going to do tomorrow,” he said. “There are parts about that I like and parts about that I don’t like.
“I’m not married to any certain spot. That might be good because I’ll just be fishing.”
The angler who made the biggest move on Day 2 was Texas pro Keith Combs. With the day’s biggest bag of 23-10, he jumped from 43rd place into 13th. Canadian pro Jeff Gustafson earned Berkley Big Bass honors for the day with a 7-3 largemouth, but South Carolina angler Todd Auten still holds the lead for big bass of the week with the 7-9 he caught Friday.
The tournament concludes Sunday with the Top 25 remaining anglers taking off at 7 a.m. CT from Civitan Park in Guntersville. Fans planning to attend the takeoff should make note of the time change for Daylight savings time.
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Hank Cherry, of Lincolnton, N.C., is leading after Day 1 of the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk with 29 pounds, 3 ounces. - Photo by Gary Tramontina/B.A.S.S.
Hank Cherry, of Lincolnton, N.C., is leading after Day 1 of the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk with 29 pounds, 3 ounces. - Photo by Gary Tramontina/B.A.S.S.
BIRMINGHAM, Ala. — Halfway through Day 1 of the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk, North Carolina pro Hank Cherry fell and injured his right arm.
For a moment, he thought it might even be broken.
But Cherry powered through the pain — and with only one good arm, he caught five bass that weighed 29 pounds, 3 ounces to take the lead at the 50th edition of the Super Bowl of Professional Bass Fishing. Competition is taking place on Lake Guntersville with weigh-ins at the Birmingham-Jefferson Convention Complex.
Cherry said his injury, which occurred as he was reaching down to grab a fish, would likely require a visit to a local doctor — but it wouldn’t keep him from fishing Saturday morning.
“I didn’t expect to catch them like this at all,” Cherry said. “What I caught my fish on was actually plan B. But it’s plan A now, for sure.”
Believing the location and structure he was fishing were the real key to his success, Cherry made no secret of the bait he was using. He said he started with a lipless crankbait, but the high winds kept a loop in his line and made it hard for him to maintain proper contact with the bait.
“That’s why I switched to a bladed jig,” he said. “It just made more sense for the conditions we were fishing, and it turned out to be the perfect choice.”
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Z-Man Report
Kristine Fischer, tournament champion and the newest member of Z-Man’s influential pro-staff
“For a kayak angler like me, the resilience of ElaZtech baits are a dream come true,” acknowledges Kristine Fischer, tournament champion and the newest member of Z-Man’s influential pro-staff.
Fischer, an emerging angling rockstar who won the 2019 Hobie Bass Open at Kentucky Lake, admits to catching big bass on Z-Man soft plastics and ChatterBait® Bladed Jigs well before she ever met the folks behind the popular fish-catching baits.
“I’m a power fisherman first, and a Z-Man ChatterBait JackHammer™ helped me cash my first check in a national bass tournament,” notes the Weeping Water, Neb. native, who now travels and fishes across America with her fiancé AJ.
“Kristine is a talented and diehard angler who has a habit of staying on the water longer than anyone else,” says Z-Man pro staff and promotions manager Joey Prochazka. “Not only does she effectively represent the kayak fishing community—who were early adopters of our ElaZtech baits—Kristine is also a dedicated ice angler and muskie hunter, truly a trailblazer.”
During her travels, which include an impressive 25 tournament stops from California to Georgia, Fischer has added finesse tactics to her bag of tricks.
“The nationwide phenomenon of Z-Man finesse baits extends well beyond their attraction to smallmouth and largemouth bass,” she says. “The fact I can confidently grab a single bag of Hula StickZ™ or TRD CrawZ™ and know that six baits will be more than enough for a day—or even a week—of fishing is a huge advantage for a kayak angler.”
Fischer believes minimizing the tackle inventory in her Hobie Pro Angler is a time-saver as well as a necessity.
“For us, it’s all about packing light and keeping hot baits at our fingertips. I can easily fish a two-day tournament on one bag of Finesse TRD®s or DieZel MinnowZ™, while other brand baits might get torn up after a few bites and require me to carry five extra bags. Actually, I’d probably carry ElaZtech baits regardless, because their buoyancy, action and knack for scoring big bites just excels.”
Kristine Fischer, tournament champion and the newest member of Z-Man’s influential pro-staff
Fischer, who aspires to eventually compete on one of the “big boat” bass tours, has been a revelation and an inspiration to other women following her career as a tournament-winning kayak angler.
“All the years I’ve been fishing I’ve never wanted to be singled out as a female angler,” she admits. “Honestly, I’ve just wanted to blend in with the rest of the competitive anglers and be respected as an angler and not have any extra accreditations that come with being a rarity in the sport. This past year, though, I’ve had so many women reach out and tell me how inspiring this is. So, I realize it’s not necessarily about me, but perhaps about something much bigger.”
Adds Prochazka: “Giving a voice to all female anglers is important to Z-Man because women are a legitimate and underserved part of our industry. We wanted to help give other women someone to root for in the angling community.
“We didn’t rush into this,” he continues. “But as we worked out the details it became abundantly clear that Kristine was so much more than a smiling face. She’s a cerebral angler with a high motor who’s also very selective and analytical about her decisions. No doubt, everyone in our office is absolutely thrilled to welcome Kristine aboard. She’s a super-driven angler, a terrific person and someone who gets things done.”
Fischer echoes the advice she often shares with fellow female anglers: “Admittedly, competitive kayak fishing can be an intimidating sport. It’s male-dominated and something you don’t see a lot of women excelling in because there just aren’t that many of us. But if you are truly passionate about something, go out there and do it with every single bit of your being— and if you believe in yourself, you will succeed.”