Tag: Wilson Lake

Day 1 of the Kansas Bass Youth Team Series on Wilson Lake, we had already 2 fish in the livewell at our first stop. As we moved to the second stop, the wind and boat traffic made it very hard to fish. So I decided to drive all the way into the back of the pocket. We pulled up to a grass point and on the first cast, Nick caught our third keeper. It was just at 15 inches, so we need to creel him to have a chance. Fished a little more in the back as another boat joined us in the little pocket. Moving out along the bluff wall, there was a little cut that Kyle missed a fish. I figured it was a bedding fish. So we backed out, and Nick threw up there and dragged it into the spot. He stop moving it, and just then his line took off. I’m not sure he had a good hookset. If you watch the video, you will see. If you have the right rod and reel, all you have to do is lean into the fish. You don’t really want to set the hook too hard because you can pull or pop the hook out of its mouth. It was a good 3.12lb largemouth. I figured we had finally caught one we wouldn’t have to creel. With 4 fish in the livewell at 10am, it was a great start.

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We moved just a little more down the back, watching another boat catch a good one in front of us. As they went around us, Kyle hooked up with number 5. The next hour, we caught fish after fish. We creeled 3 of the smaller fish in the next hour. All the fish in the livewell were between 3.04 to 3.12lbs. Just then Nick set the hook. I was like “Really? Again?” It jumped and shad guts flew everywhere. It was a big smallmouth. As Nick played it, Kyle was praying that we landed the fish. Nick got the fish in the net, and it was the biggest fish at a weight of 3.14lbs. We had around 17 pounds. After talking a little to another boat with a couple of guys that I know very well, they told us to stop fishing and save some fish for the next day. Boys didn’t want to stop fishing, but they did from 11:30 am to 1:45 pm. We protected the spot from other boats. Twins would cast out deeper and take breaks. Around 1pm, Kyle said “I’m casting to the spot.” I was like ok. Just as I said “Ok,” he set the hook. Not good, because it was another 3 pound smallmouth. The first half of the field weighed in, and only had 2fish or no fish. But one team had 14.90 lbs. As the scale stopped at 17.54 lbs, we had an almost 2 1/2 pound lead. All we have to do is bring in a limit on day 2 and the championship would be ours.