Top 10 Baits from the KY Lake College Open
Prespawn power fishing produced most of the top 10 catches
Strike King lures fished by Tennessee River locals from Tennessee, Kentucky and Alabama dominated the 2017 YETI FLW College Fishing Open on Kentucky Lake, with just a few exceptions. All the anglers dealt with changing weather and extreme wind shifts (and pretty nasty waves), as well as fickle fish that were staging to move up and spawn. The result was an up-and-down tournament for many in the field.
Finesse options were popular among the 194 teams who competed, but most of the top 10 teams found their best success by cranking, fishing jigs and dragging Carolina rigs.
Here’s what they used.
1. The champs – Dylan True and Matthew Lamastus of University of Tennessee at Martin – won the Open with two primary programs. The first was cranking steep rocky banks outside spawning pockets with a Strike King Series 5 in citrus shad and a Strike King KVD 2.5 in black back/chartreuse. Cranking produced most of their mammoth day-one bag of 25 pounds, 15 ounces. On day two, a Carolina-rigged Strike King Rage Lizard duped several critical kickers. True and Matthews mixed in a 4 1/2-inch Strike King Shadalicious swimbait fished on a jighead made by True and his father.
2. Runners-up Koby Littrell and Martin McCravy of University of North Alabama fished a 1-ounce chartreuse/white spinnerbait with a Zoom Fat Albert Grub trailer and a 1/2-ounce War Eagle Finesse Jig with a Strike King Menace Grub (green pumpkin) trailer.
3. Slow, slow, slow is the way that Murray State Racers Nick Montilino and Brock Spencer fished a 1/4-ounce black-and-blue jigs. They used an Outkast Tackle R.T.X. Jig and a Spenceanator Jig (made by Spencer's uncle) with a green pumpkin Strike King Structure Bug trailer to finish in third place.
4. Bryan College’s Cole Sands and Nathan Bell found a solid jig bite to finish in fourth place. They used an MGC Sniper Flipping Jig in the magic craw color with a green pumpkin Strike King Rage Craw trailer. They also threw a Strike King KVD 1.5 square-bill in the chartreuse sexy shad color.
5. Tennessee Volunteer anglers Bradley Devaney and Saxton Long earned fifth place with classic soft-plastic rigs: a Carolina-rigged green pumpkin Berkley PowerBait Chigger Craw and a Texas-rigged green pumpkin Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver.
6. Austin Mize and Ethan Goodwin also represented University of North Alabama in the top 10. They cranked a Rapala DT-6 and a Jenko Fishing CD Squared, and fished a 1/2-ounce black-and-blue jig with a Big Bite Baits Fighting Frog (hematoma) as a trailer.
7. Tyler Black and Ryan Winchester of Bethel University threw a pair of 1/2-ounce Strike King Red Eye Shad lipless crankbaits to make the top 10 and qualify for the National Championship. Bleeding chrome black back and gold chrome sexy shad were their preferred colors.
8. All the way from Michigan, Adrian College’s Nicholas Czajka and Jack Hippe III came down to Kentucky Lake and pounded out a top-10 finish with a Rapala DT-6 in the demon color, a Terminator football-head jig with a brown and orange skirt and a green pumpkin Berkley PowerBait Chigger Craw trailer, and a Bugsy’s Baits swimbait.
9. The second Bethel team to make the top 10, Brian Pahl and John Coble Garrett got it done with a Strike King Red Eye Shad Silent (chartreuse baitfish) and a Strike King KVD 2.5 square-bill (sexy shad).
10. Rounding out the top 10 is the University of Louisiana-Monroe’s Thomas Soileau and Hunter Freeman, who fished a Carolina-rigged green pumpkin Zoom Magnum Lizard and a 3/4-ounce green pumpkin football jig with a matching Strike King Space Monkey trailer.