Powerhouse Montevallo takes School of the Year for third time in four years
The race for Tackle Warehouse School of the Year Presented by QuikTrip goes down to the wire nearly every year, and 2024 was no exception – the points were tight at the top. Lately, the University of Montevallo wins almost every year, too, and that stayed true. After finishing second to Auburn University in 2023, the Falcons got back on top of the standings for the third time in four years.
Abu Garcia College Fishing Presented by YETI has continued to grow, and with the institution of a national schedule in 2024, competition for School of the Year was very concentrated. All told, five different teams accumulated more than 1,700 points, with the two best finishes from three events counting toward the total. For Montevallo, that meant the team earned points at Table Rock, Lake Guntersville and Lake Chickamauga.
At Table Rock, Nicholas Dumke and Easton Fothergill won the event with James Dubose and Daylon Milam finishing third. There, Montevallo put three other teams in the Top 20, including Peyton Harris and Dalton Head, who won last year’s National Championship. Later in the season, Logan Plueger and Charlie Wright finished sixth at Guntersville, with Dumke and Fothergill finishing ninth.
To wrap up the season and edge out the University of North Alabama, Montevallo knocked their lights out at Chickamauga. Finishing second was the team of Connor Bell and Dumke, with Miller Dowling and Mason Kornegay finishing third. Incredibly, though it didn’t matter for points, Montevallo put five more teams in the Top 20 – a tour de force to prove the strength and depth of the program.
Team-first approach pays off for the Falcons
William Crawford, the Outdoor Scholars Program Director and Head Fishing Coach at Montevallo, has helped mold the fishing program into one of if not the best in the country. Folding the bass fishing team into the President’s Outdoor Scholars program in 2015 gave it more resources, and Crawford has since recruited a team of stars from all over the country.
“Our guys have bought in to this process that that we’ve laid out over the last four or five years,” Crawford said. “It’s just a special group to be around, and it’s fun to sit back and watch them perform. We have such a diverse group of guys that it really doesn’t matter where we go. It seems like somebody always figures it out.”
While Montevallo has produced some real bass fishing stars lately, the foremost among them, Fothergill, credits the coach.
“Since the year before I got there — it would have been the ‘19 season — they’ve had a pretty solid team, and that’s mainly due to the coach, William Crawford, being able to recruit from every corner of the country,” said Fothergill, who is from Minnesota. “It just brings so much knowledge to one school and one team, and we’re all able to bounce ideas off each other and really learn. I think that’s the main reason why the team has had so much success.”
Crawford also credits recruiting and building a team-first atmosphere.
“I think it has a lot to do with just the guys that we bring in,” Crawford said. “They fit the mold for what we try to do and accomplish. So, it’s just finding the right guys that fit our program and the way we try to run and operate things.”
This year, while Montevallo was on fire in the college ranks, their highfliers also did well at higher levels. Fothergill won two Bassmaster Opens, and Head made it into the Knockout Round of REDCREST on Lay Lake – a testament to how deep the talent pool is at Montevallo, and perhaps college in general.
Dumke, who is in his fifth year on the team and pursuing a MBA, has seen a lot in college fishing and said this year was exceptional.
“It was a fun one,” Dumke said. “It was one of the hardest ones I can think of in my time being there. It’s crazy what the competition level has come to. Everybody is really putting teams together that are competing at the highest level, and kids are really kicking out crazy bags. It seems like it’s getting better and better every single year. We had to work for it at every single event.”
Like many collegiate anglers, Dumke has had an irreplaceable experience.
“The best decision I’ve ever made was to go to Montevallo,” he said. “What William has done with the program is absolutely incredible. The guys that are there, I’ve truly made a bunch of lifetime friends, guys that I’ll be talking to for a long, long time. It’s meant the world to me, and it’s definitely the best decision I’ve ever made.”
Top 10 schools in the 2024 Tackle Warehouse School of the Year standings
1. University of Montevallo – 1,782 points
2. University of North Alabama – 1,767
3. Bethel University – 1,755
4. LSU-Shreveport – 1,739
5. Carson-Newman University – 1,709
6. McKendree University – 1,683
7. Campbellsville University – 1,652
8. Tarleton State – Stephenville – 1,636
9. Northwestern State University – 1,629
10. Drury University – 1,619
Signups for the 2025 season start Dec. 9, and the schedule is out now.