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The Penn State team of Seth Baker and Jeremy Lake won the National Guard FLW College Fishing Northern Division event on Lake Erie.

ERIE, Pa. – The Penn State team of Seth Baker and Jeremy Lake won the final qualifying National Guard FLW College Fishing Northern Division event on Lake Erie Saturday with four bass weighing 8 pounds, 12 ounces. The victory earned the team $10,000 to be split evenly between the university and the university’s bass-fishing club. The win also helped them advance to the Northern Division Regional Championship where they could ultimately win a Ranger 177TR with a 90-horsepower engine wrapped in school colors for their school’s bass club and $25,000 for the school they represent.

“What a great experience,” said Baker, a sophomore in Environmental Systems Engineering. “This was my first FLW Outdoors tournament and my first time fishing on Lake Erie. I can’t believe we won.

“We had prepared for fishing on the lake (Erie) but when we got here we learned that conditions wouldn’t permit us to go out so we had to make some adjustments. We went as close to the off-limits mark as we could and targeted rock piles. I caught my largemouth using a Zoom 3-inch tube.”

Due to high winds teams were confined to Presque Isle Bay and Penn State was one of the teams that was able to adjust to the elements better than most. They had planned to fish 25 to 30 feet of water, but instead fished 10- to 15-foot depths. They knew Erie was famous for its large smallmouth bass and came prepared to whack them using a drop-shot.

“I hadn’t really used the drop-shot before, but I knew I had to learn in a hurry once I got here,” said Lake, a junior in Wildlife and Fisheries Science. “I just kept at it and was able to pull in two smallmouths and one largemouth. It was slow fishing but we were able to grind it out and hang on for the win.”

Rounding out the top five teams and also qualifying for the Northern Regional Championship are:

2nd: Carnegie Mellon University – Ryan Buckheit and Paul Kimball, Jr., three bass, 8-8, $5,000

3rd: Virginia Tech – Michael Freas and Wyatt Blevins, three bass, 6-11, $4,000

4th: Wayne State University – Peter Bommarito and Andrew Smith, two bass, 6-8, $3,000

5th: University of North Carolina, Charlotte – Joe Kinchen and Tyler Teer, two bass, 6-6, $2,000

The National Guard FLW College Northern Regional Championship is scheduled for Nov. 11-13, at Jordan Lake in Raleigh, N.C. The three-day tournament will be hosted by North Carolina State University and will be televised on VERSUS Dec. 19 from 12:30 to 1:30 EST.

Also qualifying for the Northern Regional were:

Chestnut Hill College – John Reading and Adrian Avena

Christopher Newport – Ryan Ingalls and Joe Wilkerson

Fairmont State University – Wil Dieffenbauch and Brent Dodrill

Glenville State College – Dustin Vaughan and Andrew Darby

Messiah College – Daniel Poli and Louis Wenger

North Carolina State University – Jeff Bumgarner and Will White

North Carolina State University – Ben Dziwulski and Kevin Beverley

Radford University – Matthew Conners and Tyler Vaughn

Rensselaer – Mike Ahrens and Tom Cooley

Rensselaer – Jonathan Cummings and Steven Taylor

University of North Carolina, Charlotte – Tyler Beam and Eric Self

Vermont Technical College – Justin Brouillard and Ben Cayer

Virginia Tech – Jody White and Carson Rejzer

West Point – Justin Hunter and Hugh Clark

West Virginia University – Corey Straight and Corey Hill

The top five teams from each regional championship will advance to the National Guard FLW College Fishing National Championship. The National Championship is a three-day televised event hosting the top five teams from each regional, 25 total teams. Teams will be provided jerseys and wrapped Ranger boats towed by Chevy trucks for this competition.

Click here for more details and special offers

Part 1: A Little Bit of Difference

Question: Mark, how did you finish on the Bassmaster Elite Circuit last year?

Davis: I was down in 50th place somewhere. 2009 was the worst year in my entire fishing career.

Question: How did you take a year of professional fishing like last year and make such a major turnaround to be doing as well as you are this year? You can’t come from way back in the pack to placing in the top 10 or 15 bass fishermen in the world just being lucky. What are you doing this year that’s changed the course of your fishing career to the upside?

Davis: Preparation has a lot to do with it. I believe the more time you spend getting ready to fish, the better you’ll fish. Also, I’ve really been studying the lakes on the schedule this year, and then trying to go pre-fish them. Another advantage I’ve had is we’ve fished quite a few lakes this year where the bass have been in the post-spawn condition. That’s normally a strong time of year for my style of fishing. I’ve also put in extra work effort, and I think all of these ingredients together have helped me this year.

Question: What about the post-spawn favors your kind of fishing?

Davis: After the spawn, the bass move out to deeper water and tend to gang-up and school-up. I’ve been able to catch a lot of bass on crankbaits like Strike King’s Series 6 XD. I couldn’t keep the bass off that lure at Guntersville. I easily could have caught 100 or more bass on the Series 6 XD each day I fished Guntersville. When we went to Clarks Hill, the bite was much-more difficult. The bass just didn’t want to bite a crankbait for me, so I caught them on Strike King’s Rage Lizard.

Question: What are you doing now that you weren’t doing last year with your fishing?

Davis: Well, besides catching fish, I’m making better decisions on the water than I made last year, and I’m able to find fish and stay on them better than I did last year. At the level of bass fishing in the Elite Series now, there’s a very-fine line between fishing in the middle of the pack and fishing at the head of the pack. I know a lot of people don’t realize just how fine that line is. I think I’ve just been able to put the lures, the fish, my depth finders and the lakes together a little better than I did last year, and that little-bit better at this level of fishing can make a big difference in the size of check you take home.

Virginia’s Crews Bests Reese by Ounce in Bassmaster Elite Series Opener on California Delta

ESPN B.A.S.S.
Published March 14, 2010

The equivalent, for an angler, to Lebron James swishing a last-second three-pointer is to land a 5-pounder on the last cast.  John Crews of Salem, Va., executed that feat on the California Delta in the grandest of fashions Sunday to score victory at the Duel in the Delta, the Bassmaster Elite Series season-opener.

That fish added just enough weight to Crews’ four-day total of 72 pounds, 6 ounces, to best Skeet Reese of Auburn, Calif., by the slimmest of margins.  Reese (72-5) was visibly shaken.  Crews wasn’t.

“This is just unbelievable,” said Crews, 31.  “When it’s your time, it’s just your time.  I knew I was on the fish to win and I never have had that feeling before.  I’m almost speechless.”

Fans can catch extended analysis on Bassmaster.com and ESPN2 will recap the entire competition on the Sunday, March 28, edition of The Bassmasters at 10:30 a.m. ET. The episode will air again Saturday, April 17, at 10 a.m. ET.

Crews certainly seemed to have a horseshoe in his back pocket this weekend.  But ultimately, Crews identified an area that many of his Elite brethren overlooked. His success can be directly tied to identifying an area that was immune to the changing conditions that plagued many on the Delta this week.

Case in point: Crews weighed his heaviest limits on Friday and Sunday.  The conditions on those days were on total opposite ends of the spectrum with Sunday producing blue-bird skies while Friday rain, wind and frigid conditions prevailed.

The four-time Bassmaster Classic qualifier concentrated on a dead-end slough that held deep, thick hydrilla in 4 to 8 feet of water depth.  He worked the flipping stick slowly and methodically.  As with most of the competitors this week, patience was a virtue for Crews as keeper bites were few and far between.

But when he got one, he made it count.  He primarily used a sweet beaver through the first three rounds of competition but switched to a Gambler BB Cricket on the final day.  The move paid off as Crews brought the only 20-plus pound limit – actually 20-8 – to the scales on Sunday.

“I found that area the first day of practice and actually only got one bite in there,” said Crews, who took his first BASS victory Sunday.  “But there was something that looked right there.  The water was deeper and the fish weren’t moving.  And they were kept off the bank because of the boat traffic.  The bite wasn’t tide-dependent and I knew it could be a winning area if I executed.”

The victory is sweet redemption after an “atrocious” beginning to the 2009 Elite season.  Though he missed out on qualifying for the 2010 Classic, Crews finally felt he was starting to put something together late last year.  Mentally, he said, he was in a good place and he was able to extend the good vibes into this week.  Now, his confidence is soaring.

“Right now, I’m in such a good place with my fishing,” said Crews.  “I don’t know how I will do at Clear Lake (the next Elite event) but I know I have a chance of winning.  And that feels good.”

Reese is no stranger to just missing out on victory – he lost the 2007 Classic by mere ounces — but even with his unfavorable luck, the sting of losing by one ounce was evident.  Like Crews, Reese was able to piece together solid days throughout the event while other anglers were all over the map.

Reese fished two areas Sunday and switched up his bait choice – a chigger craw, creature bait and chatterbait.  He explored new water in the morning that led to little success.  But then he moved to his primary area – a long run from the launch location – and was able to put together 18 pounds, 12 ounces, a weight he thought was good enough to claim his fourth BASS victory.

Reese wanted nothing more than to claim victory in front of the vibrant homestate final-day crowd of 5,900, but it wasn’t in the cards.

“I’m speechless right now,” said Reese, the 2007 Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year.  “I had a great week overall but I hate finishing second.  I really hate it.  All you can hope for is to keep positioning yourself to get the victory and they will come.”

Still, Reese, who is at the top of his game, has his eyes on a larger prize.  Reese earned valuable Toyota Tundra Bassmaster Angler of the Year points and his top nemesis, Kevin VanDam – who has scored the last two AOYs – stumbled a bit here and the season promises to be a back-and-forth battle between the two titans.

It was Saturday leader Greg Hackney of Gonzales, La., who opened the door for Crews and Reese.  After a tremendous 25-plus pound limit Saturday, Hackney stumbled Sunday, failing to catch a limit.

“I had two on that could have made the difference,” said Hackney, the 2004 Rookie of the Year.  “But that’s on me.”

In fourth was Mike Iaconelli of Pittsgrove, N.J., with 70-4.  Rounding out the top five was Shaw Grigsby of Gainesville, Fla., with 63-11.

The next event for Elite Series anglers is the Golden State Shootout on fish-factory Clear Lake on March 18-21.  The Lakeport, Calif.-based event set then-BASS records in 2007 and with warming conditions promises to be another shootout.  The Elite Series is comprised of eight regular-season events and the Bassmaster Elite Series Postseason.

Elite anglers were competing on the California Delta for a $100,000 first-place prize, points toward qualifying for the Bassmaster Elite Series postseason and 2011 Bassmaster Classic.

Stockton, the state’s 13th largest city and seat of San Joaquin County, is situated on the San Joaquin Delta Waterway – also known as the California Delta because the area forms a triangle with the three points being Sacramento, Stockton and Pittsburg, Calif. The Delta encompasses 1,000 miles of navigable, fishable water in a labyrinth of sloughs, canals, channels and islands, one factor that makes tournament fishing there so tough – and so good.

Bassmaster Elite Series Official Sponsors: Toyota, Berkley, Evan Williams Bourbon, Humminbird, Mercury, Minn Kota, Skeeter and Yamaha.

Bassmaster Elite Series Supporting Sponsors: Lowrance and Triton Boats

About BASS

For more than 40 years, BASS has served as the authority on bass fishing.  The organization advances the sport through advocacy, outreach and its expansive tournament structure while championing efforts to connect directly with the passionate community of bass anglers through its Bassmaster media vehicles.

As the flagship offering of ESPN Outdoors, the Bassmaster brand and its considerable multimedia platforms are guided by a mission to serve all fishing fans. Through its industry-leading publications Bassmaster Magazine, BASS Times and Fishing Tackle Retailer; comprehensive Web properties in Bassmaster.com, BASSInsider.com, ESPNOutdoors.com and ESPN360.com, and ESPN2 television programming, Bassmaster provides rich, leading-edge content true to the lifestyle.