Written and Media by Chris Brooks.
The Big Bass Bash, presented by Cabela’s, was a tough one for the Greenville University Bass Fishing Team. The water was starting to drop, and unlike the FLW tournament they had fished just days before, the anglers still found it tough to locate some key fish. The grand prize would be awarded to the angler who weighed in the largest bass of the tournament. The award for the tournament was over $5,000 in prizes, including a Power-Pole certificate worth $2,000, as well as a Berkley tackle package. A total of close to 500 anglers from across the country traveled to Kentucky Lake in Paris, Tennessee, to compete in one of the biggest and most enjoyable tournaments of the year. The tournament was held on March 9 and 10.
The Greenville anglers who traveled to this event were Chris Brooks and Ricky Huge, Cale Jausel and Evan Seggerman, Cordell Beckmann and Ryan Rakers, and finally Quinten Brown and Hannah Hill. All but one of these anglers had traveled to the prior FLW tournament, also held on Kentucky Lake in Gilbertsville, Kentucky. This tournament was one of the biggest of the year for all college anglers, with a lot of school-of-the-year points at risk if they do not do well. The competition is usually really stiff, with many of the best college anglers in the country coming to compete.
In this year’s tournament, all of the top 10 teams in the country competed, with a majority of the top 50 schools coming to try to earn valuable points since this event was worth double for those who weighed in a fish.
Although it was tough for Greenville anglers, they did manage to find a few nice catches to help solidify some points for the team. The biggest fish caught for Greenville was by angler Quinten Brown, who weighed in a fish that was 5.75 lbs. This fish gave him 5th place for the 3rd session of the first day. For the 5th place in that weigh-in, Brown won a new Abu Garcia Veritas rod paired with an Abu Garcia Revo STX reel. The next angler was Cordell Beckmann, who weighed in a fish that weighed 5.16 lbs. Finally, Evan Seggerman weighed in a bass that came in at 5.04 lbs. Although Beckmann and Seggerman did not win anything during this bash, they gained the team some valuable school-of-the-year points.
From this tournament, Greenville was able to jump a massive 39 spots from 70th to 31st place, just a few hundred points away from the top 15. They gained a total of 702 points because of the three fish caught by Brown, Beckmann, and Seggerman. The overall winner of this event was Brian Pahl of Bethel University in McKenzie, Tennessee.
Be sure to check back next week to learn about what happened at the Bassmaster Classic that was held at Lake Hartwell in Greenville, South Carolina!
