Top 5 Patterns from Fort Gibson – Day 2

WAGONER, Okla. – Tough as nails. Tougher than nails. A grind. Things have not been easy for any of the top teams in the Abu Garcia College Fishing Presented by YETI National Championship on Fort Gibson Lake. Prespawn conditions with wind, cold and rain have an already stingy fishery doing anything but showing out. The quality has been there for many of the teams, but culling is a distant memory for most anglers in the event and after today, every hotel room and rental house in the Wagoner area probably looks like a tornado went through a laundromat.

Mostly a straightforward prespawn event, the same staples of a jig, spinnerbait and crankbait that normally play in Oklahoma are leading the way. It’s just that most teams aren’t catching a lot, which means the top three teams are literally within 2 ounces of each other going into the final day, and it’s honestly wide open throughout the Top 10.  

2. Austin Anderson and Cal Cameron – Stephen F. Austin – 29-6 (9)       

One of a number of Texas teams doing well, Austin Anderson and Cal Cameron are carrying the flag for SFA and looking pretty dangerous thanks to a Day 2 adjustment. After tallying 13 pounds on Day 1, the pair put 16-6 on the scale on Day 2 to rocket up from seventh.

“Cypress trees is what we started on, that’s what we were keying in on yesterday,” said Cameron, a junior entrepreneurship major. “But today, [Austin] caught one on a cypress tree and we tried to play off that, and it was not working out.”

“We could tell it was fading,” said Anderson, a graduate and a carp guide in Texas. “We made a big, big change and started fishing stuff we didn’t even practice on and it worked great for us.”

Throwing a spinnerbait and a jig dirt shallow, the pair dumped a sixth fish that would have put them in the lead. Obviously, tomorrow’s sunny and crisp conditions will change things, but it seems Anderson and Cameron might be on to something.  

“I don’t know how many bites we can get off it,” said Cameron. “It’s just so hard to get bites, they’re so few and far between. If we can get those five bites, we’ve just got to get them in the boat.”

“The biggest one, it was one of the most epic bites I’ve ever seen,” said Anderson. “We had the boat next to a tree, Cal cast his spinnerbait past it, and he was bringing it right by the tree, right by the boat, and the fish came up and nailed it.”

Anderson first took Cameron fishing at a pond when he was in sixth grade, and Cameron later followed him to SFA. With both having grown up near Texoma, they’re feeling pretty comfortable on the water and fishing like the tight-knit team they are.

“A lot of the stuff we’re keying in on looks similar to spots we’ve been fishing since we were little kids,” said Anderson.

3. Lafe Messer and Matt Messer – Kentucky Christian University – 29-5 (9)           

The brothers Messer hung in on Day 2 with four for 11 and change, which dropped them one spot and moved them from 1 ounce back to 2 ounces back of the lead.

“Today was tougher than nails on us,” said Lafe, a senior majoring in accounting. “We caught out first keeper at 8:30, and then didn’t have another keeper bite until about 2:30. We figured out how to catch them with about an hour left, and put three keepers in the boat and lost two.”

Cranking rock down the lake, the brothers needed to make a slight change that took them a long time to figure out.

“We were in the same area, a bait adjustment was what made the difference today,” said Matt, a sophomore accounting major. “That wind yesterday dirtied up our areas a little more than what they were and we just had to make a little color change to get them to bite. We ended up running back through our same areas we caught them on yesterday and caught them this afternoon.”

With over 170 teams in action, Fort Gibson has been pounded this week, but the brothers are pretty confident that Championship Thursday could be their best day yet. Despite the pressure, they think their areas aren’t worn out yet.

“I think every bass we caught off them today was not there yesterday,” said Lafe. “If there’s enough of them that pull up tonight and get right, then we can catch five of them.”

“I think there’s way more potential than we’ve shown the last two days,” said Matt. “The first day of practice we showed up and had 19 ½ pounds.”

Being ounces back, the brothers have a great shot at a pretty special accomplishment if things go well.

“It’d be crazy, it’s something we’ve always dreamed about,” said Lafe of the prospect of a win. “I don’t even know what I’d do.”

4. Bailey Bleser and Nathan Doty – McKendree University – 27-7 (10)    

Of late, McKendree teams have always performed well in the National Championship, but the W hasn’t happened for them … yet. However, Bailey Bleser and Nathan Doty are in a position to change that on Thursday, especially because they’re the only team in the Top 5 that has caught a limit both days.

“We had six bites today, and five of them were keepers,” said Doty, who has graduated. “We did a lot more running today, our spots this morning that we started on weren’t going right away, so we had to run around and find something. Eventually, we stumbled on a different stretch of bank that had a few more fish and we were fortunate enough to catch them.”

Essentially running a few key stretches of bank with moving baits and jigs, the pair are fairly committed to their game plan.

“It’s a grind, it’s kind of scary,” said Bleser, a senior majoring in exercise science. “We didn’t have our first keeper until almost noon today. We definitely have a pattern, it’s just a matter of keeping our heads down and hoping we get those five bites.”

As for the prospect of winning, Doty thinks it would be the perfect capstone to his collegiate career.

“It’d mean a lot,” said Doty. “I’ve been near it a lot of times, and yet to get it done. It’d be a cool way to go out, because this is the last college tournament ever for me.”

5. Justin Carr and Austin Carr – Illinois State University – 26-6 (9)           

Identical twins Justin Carr and Austin Carr put together a 15-15 bag on Day 2 to move them up the leaderboard and put them into contention heading into Championship Thursday.

“Yesterday was more of a grind, we were still trying to figure things out, we had a pretty rough practice,” said Austin. “We caught two fish on a jig, two fish on a crankbait, just going fishing the bank.

“Today, we dialed in, and went and fished the same stretch back and forth the entire day.”

Fishing a jig and a crankbait, the pair only left their hot rocky bank for a few hours midday to let it rest.

“It’s pretty much like the rest of the lake, we just found one stretch that has fish on it,” Austin explained. “Fish keep pulling up and we keep catching them, so we plan on going back there and trying to do the same thing.”