By all indications there could be quite a shakeup in the leaderboard on the final day of the Costa FLW Series Southeastern Division finale on Lake Chickamauga presented by Lowrance. Clear skies, light wind and temperatures in the 40s appeared to give bass a case of lockjaw Saturday morning.
Today is the second and final day of what was supposed to be a three-day event. Thursday fishing was cancelled due to predicted high winds. There was no cut to the top 10, so the full field of 394 anglers is fishing on this final day.
At 9:30 this morning, Friday's leader Anthony Ford only had three small keepers in the livewell.
Mike Miller, second place after Friday, had not caught a keeper as of 9:30.
Later in the morning, Buddy Gross, leader in the Southeastern Division point race, and in eighth place in the tournament Friday, had only two small keepers in the boat. Gross reported a significant drop in water temperature in his "go-to" morning spot.
Local favorite Andy Morgan from Dayton, Tenn., was flipping jigs into thick shoreline cover. He had four keepers in the boat around 10 a.m., but no big fish.
The consensus among the pros we spoke with was that today – the morning at least – has been a very tough bite. The situation was complicated by at least two other significant tournaments on the lake, meaning it was tough to find an unoccupied sweet spot.
That said, on Lake Chickamauga it seems that someone always finds enough big bites to bring in a 20-pound-plus bag. The top 10 boats Friday were all within 4 pounds of each other, and another 4-pound drop takes you down to 45th place. That means one or two big fish could rocket someone else to the top of the leaderboard following today's weigh-in.
The weigh-in will be streamed live from Dayton, Tenn., beginning at 3 p.m.
The top 40 anglers in overall points advance to fish the 2017 Costa FLW Series Championship (provided they fished all three qualifiers in a division).