Jacob Wheeler put the ultimate exclamation point on yet another dominant season when he left the Bass Pro Tour season finale on Saginaw Bay with two trophies and $250,000 in tow. Wheeler continued to prove that he’s at the top of his game and the top of the sport, earning his fourth Fishing Clash Angler of the Year title in the past five years and pushing his Bass Pro Tour win count to 10.
While Wheeler was a deserving headliner (you can read more about his latest triumph here), he was far from the only angler who made waves this season. Here’s a look back at some of the other top performers and defining storylines from a memorable 2025.
Five in a row for Floyd
It might not be possible to close the year with quite as much momentum as Wheeler, but Cole Floyd at least has a case. The Ohio pro finished the season by making five consecutive Championship Rounds (including Heavy Hitters).
Floyd finished third on Chickamauga and Nickajack (his best BPT finish ever), fourth at Heavy Hitters on Smith Mountain Lake, seventh on Kentucky Lake, then fourth at both the Potomac River and Saginaw Bay. In the process, he totaled a stout $145,000 and climbed all the way from 21st place to fourth in the Angler of the Year standings.
While Floyd’s breakout second half of the season undoubtedly had something to do with the fisheries suiting his style – he either got to lean on his shallow, power fishing strengths or his Tennessee River knowledge in all of those events – it also followed the trajectory of his career. He’s gotten better and better since joining the Bass Pro Tour in 2022. Floyd finished 48th in the points as a rookie, then improved to 31st in 2023 and 15th in 2024. He more than doubled his career Top 10 total during his hot streak, having notched four Championship Round appearances across his first three BPT seasons.
If the pattern continues, watch out for Floyd to close out his first Bass Pro Tour victory and contend for the AOY crown in 2026.
Lawrence continues rookie roll
With its stacked field and every-fish-counts scoring, joining the Bass Pro Tour can come with a steep learning curve. But all three newcomers made it look easy in 2025, headlined by Jake Lawrence.
Lawrence finished as the runner-up to Wheeler in the AOY race. He racked up five Top 10s in eight events, including perhaps the most thrilling win in BPT history when he caught a 5-pounder on a buzzbait to edge Wheeler in the final seconds on Lake Nickajack.
Lawrence’s stellar season continued a trend of rookie success – it’s the third year in a row that a BPT newcomer has both won an event and finished in the top two of the points in his debut season. Matt Becker pulled off the Saginaw Bay-AOY double to close the 2023 season, then Drew Gill won on the Chowan River and finished second to Wheeler for Angler of the Year a season ago.
Lawrence wasn’t the only rookie who made a positive first impression, either. Colby Miller nearly won his first career BPT event, finishing second to Justin Cooper by just 1-1 in the season-opener on Lake Conroe. He wound up 13th in the points. Marshall Hughes got better as the season progressed, closing his campaign with an 11th-place finish on Saginaw Bay to climb to 24th in the points and qualify for REDCREST 2026.
Hybrid format shines spotlight on traditional techniques
Entering this season, the biggest talking point was how the Bass Pro Tour’s new restrictions on forward-facing sonar would impact competition. At all seven regular-season events plus REDCREST, pros were only allowed to utilize the technology for one of three periods each day.
Looking back, the change didn’t seem to have a huge impact on the standings. Seven of the Top 10 in the AOY competition had finished among the Top 10 in at least one of the past two seasons, showing that no matter the format, the cream tends to rise to the top.
However, how they got there certainly looked different. In three of the seven regular-season events (Harris Chain, Potomac River, Saginaw Bay), the winner never turned forward-facing sonar on during the final day of competition. It didn’t play a huge role at REDCREST or Kentucky Lake, either.
And even in those events where forward-facing sonar remained a major factor, such as Lake Conroe and Lake Murray, the limitations forced anglers to mix in more traditional techniques, too. That was perhaps the biggest impact of the rule change: Viewers on MLFNOW! got to see a much broader range of baits and techniques. Throughout the course of the season, we saw tournament winners catching key fish on a lipless crankbait, a flipping stick, a buzzbait, a football jig, a wacky worm and a frog, underscoring that the jighead minnow isn’t the only way to catch a bass these days.
Other notes:
- Assuming all the BPT pros who earned invites compete in REDCREST 2026, the list of anglers to participate in every iteration of the championship event will be down to six: Wheeler, Dustin Connell, Ott DeFoe, Brent Ehrler, Edwin Evers and Michael Neal. Evers made a dramatic rally to keep his streak alive, climbing all the way from 43rd in the points to 30th with his third-place finish at Saginaw Bay.
- The 2025 season brought an interesting mix of experienced champions and first-time winners hoisting trophies. Each of the three winningiest anglers in BPT history – Wheeler, Connell and DeFoe – added at least one more red trophy to their collections (including, of course, Connell continuing his domination of REDCREST with his second straight and third total championship title). Yet we also saw three first-time winners: Cooper on Conroe, Lawrence on Chickamauga/Nickajack and Nick Hatfield at Heavy Hitters.
- Dean Rojas caught the biggest bass of the BPT season, a 9-6 on Chickamauga. That narrowly edged a 9-5 lunker caught by Terry Scroggins on Conroe.
- Speaking of big bass, Wheeler not only won Angler of the Year but finished as the top qualifier for next year’s Heavy Hitters event. That 30-angler field will also include Skeet Reese. While the Bass Fishing Hall of Famer has officially retired from touring, he’ll compete one last time on Florida’s Orange Lake next May.