Montevallo Takes Early Lead At Bassmaster College Series Wild Card On Lay Lake

Weston Hollar and Wesley Gore of the University of Montevallo are leading after Day 1 of the Carhartt Bassmaster College Series Wild Card presented by Bass Pro Shops at Lay Lake with 17 pounds, 10 ounces. 

                                                                                                                                                   Photo by Emily Hand/B.A.S.S.

June 23, 2021

Montevallo Takes Early Lead At Bassmaster College Series Wild Card On Lay Lake

SHELBY COUNTY, Ala. — Despite a long fog delay, the University of Montevallo team of Weston Hollar and Wesley Gore capitalized on what was left of the morning bite and caught five largemouth weighing 17 pounds, 10 ounces to take the Day 1 lead at the Carhartt Bassmaster College Series Wild Card presented by Bass Pro Shops on Lay Lake.

Hollar and Gore hold a 12-ounce lead over their Montevallo teammates Aaron Cherry and Chandler Holt and a 2-pound advantage over Trevor McKinney and Blake Jackson from McKendree University in Illinois.

“To be honest, we didn’t practice really hard,” Hollar said. “We have a lot of experience here and we kind of know what the fish have been doing and figured out the range of fish we were around. We went with it and grinded it out.”

Heavy rainfall from Tropical Storm Claudette drenched much of Alabama over the weekend and water levels on Lay Lake rose as a result. The higher water levels throughout the year have kept the bigger fish shallow, according to Gore, who fishes the system more than half the year.

“It is a river fishery. So, the fish prefer to be shallow, and the mud and current have kept them shallow for a long time,” he said. “I fish here 200 days out of the year. The fish haven’t made it offshore and there are a lot of big ones still shallow.”

With the higher river levels and cooler overnight temperatures, fog settled in overnight and takeoff was delayed more than an hour. Gore said he was worried the morning bite would be over by the time they reached their first spot.

“We thought it was going to hurt us. We were on fish really early in the morning and we ended up running to them and got three good bites as soon as we sat down,” he said. “We grinded it out up shallow, and in the last 30 minutes, we caught two good ones that gave us 17 at the end of the day. We caught all our fish on topwater and we caught one good one flipping.”

The duo mostly targeted largemouth bass rather than spotted bass, fishing isolated patches of grass with topwater and flipping baits, Hollar said. Gore added that they used almost an entire tank of gas running up and down the lake.

“We are trying to catch active fish,” Gore said. “We aren’t trying to sit down and fish an area really thoroughly. The fish we are chasing are bluegill eaters.”

Holding the lead with a spot in the National Championship on the line, Gore said he and Hollar are going all in tomorrow.

“It is either hero or zero,” Gore said. “We are going to get the five biggest bites we can get. It may take all day but we are going to do it. We are going to be Boat 5 in the morning, and I think that will be in our favor.”

Cherry and Holt fished shallow and deep on Day 1 to catch a limit weighing 16-14 and enter the final day in second.

“We had a pretty good day,” Cherry said. “It started off pretty slow. Caught two really early and then went without a bite until 10:30 or 11. We caught our last three really quickly, culled one more time and went prefishing a little bit trying to figure something out for tomorrow. Today we got lucky and had all largemouth.”

Holt said that three of their bigger fish were caught shallow-water before filling their limit in a deeper section of the lake.

“The quality fish aren’t out deep yet,” he added. “The shallow fish are definitely the bigger ones.”

Capitalizing on the shallow morning bite will likely be the key to success for Holt and Cherry, who are hoping they can get the bigger fish to fire before making a move offshore.

“We are going to try to hit as many shallow places as we possibly can in the morning and try and catch as many big ones as possible,” Holt said. “Once that first hour is over, it seems all the bigger fish are starting to slow down. It will be the same strategy, but I think we are going to run to a couple of different spots in the morning.”

McKinney and Jackson’s morning got off to a slow start, but the McKendree duo found a pattern midmorning that helped them fill a 15-11 limit and enter the final day in third place.

“We had one fish at like 9:30,” McKinney said. “We caught our fish in three or four different areas, but mostly doing the same thing. We were fishing shallow and fishing current.”

Both anglers reached the final day of the College Classic Bracket at Lay Lake last season, with McKinney taking the victory and earning the Classic berth. He finished 31st in the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic presented by Huk at Lake Ray Roberts in Texas earlier this month.

Finding better than average bites has been the key, Jackson said.

“Our practice was fairly good. We found a lot of areas that had fish, but look at how many limits have crossed the stage,” Jackson said. “It is just a matter of getting those two or three big bites.”

Matthew Cummings and Joseph Wood from Bethel University caught a 7-4 largemouth to take the lead in the Carhartt Big Bass of the Tournament standings.

The full field will take off from Beeswax Creek Park at 5:30 a.m. CT Thursday and return at 1:30 p.m. for the weigh-in. The Top 12 teams will punch their ticket to the 2021 Carhartt Bassmaster College Series National Championship presented by Bass Pro Shops at the St. Lawrence River Aug. 12-14.

2021 Carhartt Bassmaster College Series Wild Card presented by Bass Pro Shops 6/23-6/24Lay Lake, Columbiana  AL.(BOATER) Standings Day 1

    Angler                                       Club/School                       Pts

1.  Weston Hollar – Wesley Gore                  University of Montevallo            250Day 1: 5   17-10   Total:   5  17-102.  Aaron Cherry – Chandler Holt                 University of Montevallo            249Day 1: 5   16-14   Total:   5  16-143.  Trevor McKinney – Blake Jackson              McKendree University                248Day 1: 5   15-11   Total:   5  15-114.  Kayden Tanner – Trevor Easter                Tarleton State University           247Day 1: 5   15-05   Total:   5  15-055.  Matthew Cummings – Joseph Woods              Bethel University                   246Day 1: 5   14-14   Total:   5  14-146.  Lane Bailey – Justin Eggers                  CVCC RedHawks                       245Day 1: 5   14-12   Total:   5  14-127.  Jake Kimbrough – Grant Busby                 Blue Mountain College               244Day 1: 5   14-07   Total:   5  14-078.   Dale Hansard – Mason Lee                    Jacksonville State University       243Day 1: 5   14-02   Total:   5  14-029.  Grant Lesage – Zach Davis                    Southeastern Louisiana Universit    242Day 1: 5   13-12   Total:   5  13-1210. Davian Smith – Jackson Pontius               University of Montevallo            241Day 1: 5   12-15   Total:   5  12-1511. TJ McKenzie –                                Emmanuel College                    240Day 1: 5   12-10   Total:   5  12-1012. Landon Lawson – Donavan Carson               King University                     239Day 1: 5   12-09   Total:   5  12-0913. Chase Hubble – Brent May                                                         238Day 1: 5   12-04   Total:   5  12-0414. Tyler Pendergrass –                          University of North Alabama         237Day 1: 5   12-03   Total:   5  12-0315. Cordell Beckman –                            Greenville University               236Day 1: 5   11-15   Total:   5  11-1515. Tripp Bowman – Blakely Young                 Louisiana State University-Shrev    236Day 1: 5   11-15   Total:   5  11-1515. Grayson Morris – Cal Culpepper               University of Montevalllo           236Day 1: 5   11-15   Total:   5  11-1518. Connor Hicks – Parker Kaye                   University of Tennessee             233Day 1: 5   11-13   Total:   5  11-1319. Walker Brown – Jd Bedford                    University of North Alabama         232Day 1: 5   11-09   Total:   5  11-0920. Preston Kendrick – Eli Stevenson             Bryan College                       231Day 1: 5   11-08   Total:   5  11-0820. James Willoughby – Chance Schwartz           University of Montevallo            231Day 1: 5   11-08   Total:   5  11-0822. Collin Reyes – Reagan Nelson                 Tarleton State University           229Day 1: 5   11-06   Total:   5  11-0623. Michael Postlewait – Andrew Rickman          Dallas Baptist University           228Day 1: 5   11-00   Total:   5  11-0024. Cole Thompson – Walker Sahagun               University of North Alabama         227Day 1: 5   10-10   Total:   5  10-1025. Matt Short – Colton Combs                    Eastern Kentucky University         226Day 1: 5   10-09   Total:   5  10-0926. Dax Ewart – Wilson Smith                     Bethel University                   225Day 1: 5   10-01   Total:   5  10-0127. Zack Barrera – Bryson Osteen                                                     224Day 1: 5   10-00   Total:   5  10-0028. Aaron Hawkins – Broxson Daigle               Texas A and M University            223Day 1: 5   09-15   Total:   5  09-1528. K.D. Sizemore –                              Auburn University                   223Day 1: 5   09-15   Total:   5  09-1530. Hunter Bailey – JR Young                     Jacksonville State University       221Day 1: 5   09-14   Total:   5  09-1430. Noah Campbell – Troy Harris                  GEORGIA COLLEGE                     221Day 1: 5   09-14   Total:   5  09-1432. Caz Anderson – Storm Cline                   Carson-Newman University            219Day 1: 5   09-12   Total:   5  09-1233. Tanner Barclay – Lloyd Laconsay                                                  218Day 1: 5   09-08   Total:   5  09-0834. Conner Dimauro – Justin Botts                bryan college                       217Day 1: 5   09-06   Total:   5  09-0635. David Ackerman –                                                                 216Day 1: 5   09-05   Total:   5  09-0535. Clay Tresler – Carter Carlton                Northwest Arkansas Community Col    216Day 1: 5   09-05   Total:   5  09-0535. Marshall Wiggins –                           University of Central Florida       216Day 1: 5   09-05   Total:   5  09-0538. Hunter Bond – GL Compton                     Clemson University                  213Day 1: 5   09-02   Total:   5  09-0239. Elliot Torode – Tyler Cory                   University of Montevallo            212Day 1: 5   08-15   Total:   5  08-1540. De Andre Allen – Luke Glasgow                Itawamba Community College          211Day 1: 5   08-14   Total:   5  08-1440. Ethan Shaw – Tyler Price                     Bryan College                       211Day 1: 5   08-14   Total:   5  08-1442. Sam Hanggi – Matthew Welcher                 Auburn University                   209Day 1: 4   08-14   Total:   4  08-1443. Cole Dodson – Trent Jones                    University of Montevallo            208Day 1: 5   08-13   Total:   5  08-1343. Grant Harris –                               Drury University                    208Day 1: 5   08-13   Total:   5  08-1345. Austin Goins – Elijah Kirk                   Bryan college                       206Day 1: 5   08-11   Total:   5  08-1146. Hunter MCClaskey – Nicholas Gilbert          King University                     205Day 1: 5   08-10   Total:   5  08-1047. Brayden Nichols – Kenneth Cheramie           Louisiana State University Shrev    204Day 1: 5   08-09   Total:   5  08-0948. Blake Milligan – Chase Mundhenke             Auburn University                   203Day 1: 5   08-05   Total:   5  08-0549. Reece Martin – Hunter Jenkins                Dallas Baptist University           202Day 1: 5   08-05   Total:   5  08-0550. Nate Triplett – Cody Barnes                  University of North Alabama         201Day 1: 5   08-04   Total:   5  08-0451. Jordan Pennington – Tyler Cain               University of Montevallo            200Day 1: 5   08-03   Total:   5  08-0352. Adam Carroll – Trey Dickert                  University of Montevallo            199Day 1: 5   08-02   Total:   5  08-0253. Dawson Andrews – Wyatt Ensminger             Southeastern Louisiana Universit    198Day 1: 5   08-02   Total:   5  08-0254. Jarred Jones – Logan Tate                    Jacksonville State University       197Day 1: 5   08-01   Total:   5  08-0154. Jake Thornbury – Wil Rigdon                  Campbellsville University           197Day 1: 5   08-01   Total:   5  08-0156. Matthew Benson – Nathanael Wright            Emmanuel College                    195Day 1: 5   08-00   Total:   5  08-0057. Nathan Burdett – Tyler Buchanan              Troy University                     194Day 1: 5   07-15   Total:   5  07-1558. Conner Johnson – Hunter Osborne              Georgetown college                  193Day 1: 5   07-14   Total:   5  07-1459. Anthony Cicero Iv – Cy Lambert               Bethel                              192Day 1: 5   07-12   Total:   5  07-1260. Drew Jennings – Cody Griffith                Auburn University                   191Day 1: 5   07-10   Total:   5  07-1061. Caleb Sheldon – Hayden Fuhr                  Lander University                   190Day 1: 5   07-06   Total:   5  07-0662. Parker Wilburn – Tristen Dubbs                                                   189Day 1: 5   07-06   Total:   5  07-0663. Jacob Butts – Garrett Smith                  Erskine College                     188Day 1: 5   07-05   Total:   5  07-0564. Dustin Bauer – Cody Cissell                  Campbellsville University           187Day 1: 5   07-02   Total:   5  07-0265. Thomas Mingle – Stone Payne                  Univerity of Tennessee              186Day 1: 4   07-02   Total:   4  07-0266. Corey Yaden – Blake Stephenson               Brewton Parker college              185Day 1: 5   07-00   Total:   5  07-0067. Sam Shiver – Phillip Parrish                 Faulkner University                 184Day 1: 5   06-15   Total:   5  06-1568. Drew Traffanstedt – Scott Sledge             University of Montevallo            183Day 1: 5   06-12   Total:   5  06-1269. Conner Crosby – James Cobbs                  Auburn University                   182Day 1: 2   06-12   Total:   2  06-1270. John Murphy – Johnny Richardson              Greenville Technical College        181Day 1: 5   06-10   Total:   5  06-1071. Salvador Garcia – Reese Jones                Northwest Arkansas Community Col    180Day 1: 5   06-09   Total:   5  06-0972. Syon Barnes – Hayden Bartee                  Jacksonville  State University      179Day 1: 5   06-07   Total:   5  06-0772. Chase Milholen – Levi Mullins                Bethel University                   179Day 1: 5   06-07   Total:   5  06-0774. Michael Chism – Mason Westerman              Southest Missouri State Universi    177Day 1: 5   06-03   Total:   5  06-0375. Shane Nelson – Brayden Federer               Adrian College                      176Day 1: 4   06-01   Total:   4  06-0176. Thomas Millraney – Zachary Bowen             Bethel University                   175Day 1: 5   05-15   Total:   5  05-1577. Bradley Martin – Kopeland Rosser             University of Montevallo            174Day 1: 3   05-15   Total:   3  05-1578. Luke Byerly – Drew Elrod                     University of Tennessee Knoxvill    173Day 1: 5   05-13   Total:   5  05-1378. Hunter Haraway – Malcolm Patton              Calhoun Community College           173Day 1: 5   05-13   Total:   5  05-1380. Matthew Kahrs – Brandon Comeaux              McNeese State University            171Day 1: 4   05-08   Total:   4  05-0881. Drake Hemby – Griffin Heffington             Carson-Newman University            170Day 1: 3   05-02   Total:   3  05-0282. Dustin Bargo – Connor Melton                 Western Kentucky University         169Day 1: 4   03-15   Total:   4  03-1583. Adam Hollingsworth – Matthew German                                              168Day 1: 2   03-11   Total:   2  03-1184. Clent Blackwood – Bryar Chambers             Wallace State                       167Day 1: 2   03-10   Total:   2  03-1085. Cody Gregory – Gage Sherrod                  Bethel University                   166Day 1: 4   03-07   Total:   4  03-0786. Noah Boyett – Ty Garlington                                                      165Day 1: 3   03-03   Total:   3  03-0387. Seth Roberts –                               Bethel University                   164Day 1: 2   02-14   Total:   2  02-1488. Thad Simerly –                               Tennessee Tech University           163Day 1: 2   02-09   Total:   2  02-0989. Seth Elkins – John Russell Reaves            Jacksonville State University       162Day 1: 1   01-10   Total:   1  01-1090. David Froehlich –                            Abraham Baldwin Ag College          161Day 1: 1   01-07   Total:   1  01-0790. Avery Whitwell – Jackson Holbert             University of North Alabama         161Day 1: 1   01-07   Total:   1  01-0792. Noah Coleman – Dalton Johnson                Auburn University                   159Day 1: 1   00-13   Total:   1  00-1393. Blake Banks – Wes Wilson                     University of Georgia                 0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Jalen Bean – Jacob Douglas                   SOUTHWEST MISSISSIPPI COMMUNITY       0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Sean Clayton – Owen Dimaio                   Clemson University                    0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Gavin Cloutier – Calvin Rogers               King University                       0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Reed Green – Hunter Enlow                                                          0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. James Hess – Holden Kauble                   Wabash Valley College                 0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Tyler Hudson – Evan Mcnaughton               Western Kentucky University           0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Carson Maddux – Jake Maddux                  Auburn University                     0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Callaway Robinson – Dawson Ricks             georgia college and state univer      0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Alyssa Taylor –                              Northwestern State University         0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-0093. Garrett Walters –                                                                  0Day 1: 0   00-00   Total:   0  00-00———————————————————————–TotalsDay   #Limits    #Fish      Weight1        74       417       799-10———————————-74       417       799-10

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