Hall Holds Steady For Lead

Lake Guntersville Rayovac: Minnesota pro remains concerned about chances of repeating

Joe Hall of Lake City, Minn., wasn’t confident about his chances going into the second day of competition at the Rayovac FLW Series Southeast Division event on Lake Guntersville. Nonetheless, he held steady with a 27-pound, 5-ounce catch that only barely fell short of the 28-1 he weighed on the first day, when he opened the event in second place behind Cameron Gautney.

Gautney struggled largely due to pressure from another competitor on the area he was fishing. He weighed only 20 pounds, 2 ounces today to give up his lead to Hall, the affable Minnesota pro who caught almost all of his weight off of one key staging area. With a two-day total of 55 pounds, 6 ounces, Hall has a 1-12 cushion over Gautney going into the final day of the Mercury-presented tournament. Unfortunately, he doesn’t believe his area can hold up for the final day of competition.

“We caught way fewer fish today than we caught yesterday,” says Hall. “Today my co-angler and I caught seven off my spot. Yesterday we caught about 25 off of it.”

Hall still plans on making the spot a priority on day three despite the waning number of fish there.

“I’ll try it initially, but I’m not going to die on it,” Hall adds. “I’ll probably do a lot of running. Tomorrow is kind of a bonus day for me. It’s a little unfortunate to be this high up and have nothing left to go to.”

Hall is catching his fish on a chartreuse baitfish-patterned 3/4-ounce Strike King Red Eye Shad that he settled on under unusual circumstances.

“It was the only 3/4-ounce lipless crankbait sent to me when I made my tackle order; all the rest were backordered,” he says. “I caught a couple on it in practice and they really ate it, so I figured I wouldn’t bother trying to find a red one if they liked this one so much.”

Top 10 Pros

1. Joe Hall – 55-6 (10)

2. Cameron Gautney – 53-10 (10)

3. Jay Kendrick – 52-2 (10)

4. Trevor Fitzgerald – 51-14 (10)

5. Rob Digh – 48-9 (10)

6. Mark Daniels Jr. – 48-0 (10)

7. Billy Brindle – 46-10 (10)

8. Bryan Thrift – 46-4 (10)

9. Walmart pro Mark Rose – 45-15 (10)

10. Ed Oilar – 45-0 (10)

Click here for the full results.

O’Donnell Adds 20-6, Takes Co-angler Lead

Walmart FLW Tour co-angler Casey O’Donnell of Bradenton, Fla., landed a five-bass limit 20 pounds, 6 ounces on day two to take the lead into the final day and boost his total to 45-10.

“I only got to fish until about 1 o’clock on the first day,” says O’Donnell, who nevertheless landed over 25 pounds on his shortened day.

“I had a really good draw today,” adds O’Donnell. “Hensley Powell is a really well-known guy out here. I had an easy day to be honest, I had 11 pounds early and I knew that would put me into the top 10.”

O’Donnell has caught his fish shallow throughout the whole event, and is feeling really good about tomorrow.

Top 10 Co-anglers

1. Casey O’Donnell – 45-10 (10)

2. Josh Klinghagen – 40-12 (9)

3. Justin Sward – 40-6 (10)

4. James Brooks – 34-5 (10)

5. Wayne Boyd – 34-4 (7)

6. Thomas Rubbo – 33-15 (6)

7. Alphonso Taylor – 33-9 (9)

8. Mike McDaniel – 32-2 (9)

9. Michel Purvis – 31-6 (10)

10. Nik Kayler – 30-11 (7)

Big Bass

Pro: Trevor Fitzgerald – 12-10

Co-angler: Daniel Green – 8-8

Click here for the full results.