“You should have been here yesterday” might have been the motto for the first day of fishing in the FLW College Fishing Open on Kentucky Lake. Though many of the 194 teams entered in the two-day event out of Moor’s Resort & Marina reported good to excellent practices, many of the same anglers were complaining about a lack of fish on opening morning of the competition.

What’s different? For one thing, less water is being released through the dam at Gilbertsville, and that means less current as well as less warm water being pulled up from down south. For another, the weather has stayed gloomy, and the air temperature hovered around 45 degrees most of the morning – another possible negative that has affected the bite. The weather is forecast to get warmer and sunnier this afternoon, however, so the naysayers might have better prospects then.

This morning, about two-thirds of the field headed south after they were released by FLW College Fishing Tournament Director Kevin Hunt, indicating that the better fishing still was to be found below the Highway 68 Bridge and even beyond Paris Landing in Tennessee, where the water temperature is 6 to 8 degrees warmer than in the mid-lake area. Murray State University, one of the tournament favorites, had most of its 10 teams going south, with one boat spotted headed north toward the dam and a couple of others seen running toward Duncan Bay on the east side. Likewise, the 10 teams of another frontrunner, Bethel University of McKenzie, Tenn., made a beeline for southern waters.

Whether the long run to Paris Landing and beyond was worth it will be determined by this afternoon’s weigh-in, which starts at 3 p.m. CDT and which will be streamed live on FLWFishing.com.