EUFAULA, Ala. – The last event of the Central Division season, Lake Eufaula is a great place to wrap things up. The anglers fishing the Toyota Series Presented by Phoenix Boats event should have lovely weather for the tournament, and the lake appears to be setting up to give anglers a lot of options. That doesn’t mean the fishing is likely to be easy for everyone, but big bass will be caught quite a few ways, which ought to make the event quite interesting.
“The ultimate springtime spread”
Through practice, there are enough available patterns that different anglers can see similar things, but feel quite different about them. So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that Jake Maddux and Benjamin Travis would both report plenty of variety and draw different conclusions from it.
“It’s all over the place, I think, for everybody,” Travis said. “There’s about 10 schools on the whole lake, and I think every one of us has found them. There ain’t a whole lot to be caught up shallow, that I’ve seen anyways. It seems like the ultimate springtime spread, where there’s like four of them on the bank, four of them swimming around in the middle of nowhere, and four of them out deep.”
On the other hand, “the ultimate springtime spread” might be pretty fun.
“There’s a lot of stuff going on,” Maddux said. “It’s going to be a really cool tournament – there’s fish doing a little bit of everything. Last night was the first day when a really hard mayfly hatch happened, and the lake is now up for the first time since March. So, hopefully they’ll keep it up – it helps the whole lake, the deep fish and the shallow fish.
“With the format, you’ll see a really diverse mix,” Maddux added. “Where a guy might bust them on a shad spawn in the morning, but crank a ledge for a while. There’s a big-time shad spawn going on, both offshore and up shallow.”
That mix between the offshore and shallow bite could decide the tournament – by the calendar, this one could be won deep or shallow. This week in 2021, the Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit event was a big shallow derb, with Jason Abram winning on a shad spawn up the river. Also, this same week in 2024, Jake Lawrence won the Tackle Warehouse Invitationals event fishing ledges.
From the sounds of it, that ledge transition might be minutes away.
“I think we’re all trying to push it a little hard, hoping that they’re going to get out there,” Travis said. “I don’t know that they’re going to pull the trigger; if they do, I think they’ll do it during the tournament.”
Maddux agrees that there’s no sure bet to win.
“The shallow bite has been really good, better than expected to be honest,” he said. “I figured the shad spawn would be trickling off right now. When we were there for the Open, it was just starting to pop off. The shad spawn, you only have 30 minutes, but it seems to be shutting off way earlier than expected. The brush pile shad spawn lasts a whole lot longer, but it’s not an all-day thing by any means. A lot more bream are spawning, there’s the mayfly hatch, and there are a lot more schools offshore.”
Of course, the best way to find out is to fish the tournament. And even then, it might come down to the last day, like it just did in the Pro Circuit event on Douglas, where shallow pros and deep sticks duked it out until the final weigh-in.
What will it take?
For the win, Maddux expects pretty good weights.
“You can definitely catch a big bag – I’m thinking 23 a day,” he said. “There’s a lot of stuff going on. I think it will spread guys out. I think the guy who wins will mix up a lot of different things. You can catch a 5-pounder from takeoff all the way up to Columbus all the way down to the dam.”
Travis is on a similar wavelength, but thinks that consistency could be hard to come by.
“If I had to take a wild guess, I think somebody will weigh-in a really big bag the first day – 24 to 26 pounds,” he said. “But, three days, I think if you had 22 a day you’d have a run at it. I feel like somebody is going to get a really good boat draw and get one of the few schools that has big ones in it and burn it to the ground the first day and not get back on them the second day and have a little tougher day. I feel like the guy that wins will probably be consistent.”
7 Brew Angler of the Year up for grabs
The last event of the Central Division season should be exciting, and it has plenty of layers. The points picture to make the Top 25 and the Toyota Series Championship is key, as is the race for 7 Brew Angler of the Year.
Leading so far, Travis has had a great season, knocking out a pair of Top-10 finishes on Tennessee River lakes. In second, Cal Lane is a handful of points back with a great shot to move up, and Jimmy Neece Jr. is hot on his heels.
“Me and Cal have been giving each other crap all week,” Travis said. “It definitely adds a little pressure. I wish it was more of a streamlined tournament, the fish being everywhere and having AOY on the line is definitely making it stressful.”
On the co-angler side, Alan Hults leads, with Pop Catalin and James Cobbs behind him.
Follow along
Takeoff and weigh-in are free and open to the public daily at Lakepoint Resort State Park at 6 a.m. and 2 p.m. CT. This event is hosted by the Eufaula Barbour County Chamber of Commerce. You can follow along with all the coverage at MajorLeagueFishing.com.