Louisiana’s Faucheaux Wins Co-angler Title
Boater Dicky Newberry of Houston, Texas, caught a five-bass limit weighing 22 pounds, 3 ounces, to win Sunday’s rescheduled T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) Cowboy Division event on Sam Rayburn Reservoir. For his finish, Newberry won $8,965.
“I started out fishing shallower ridges, but ended up catching staging females in drains,” said Newberry. “It took a little while to figure them out. Around 11 a.m. I worked through a drain that ran up the side of a point in deeper water. There was some scattered grass on the bottom, and I think there were females in there staging getting ready to move up to spawn.”
Newberry said the drain was around 100 feet wide and 12 feet down, and that he used a ¾-ounce red Rat-L-Trap and a Carolina-rigged lizard to catch his fish.
“I thoroughly fished the drain with both and caught 3 keepers,” said Newberry. “After that I ran to 10 or 12 different spots that looked similar to it, finding fish in over half of them. A lot of my day was about knowing where those additional drains were. I think a lot of people have a tendency to stay put if they start catching them, but I continued to move after those three bites.”
Newberry’s day was capped off with a 7-pounder at the last drain he visited, which he caught using the Rat-L-Trap.
The top 10 boaters finished the tournament in:
1st: Dicky Newberry, Houston, Texas, five bass, 22-3, $6,965 + $2,000 Ranger Cup Bonus
2nd: Joe Beebee, The Woodlands, Texas, five bass, 21-3, $2,983
3rd: Skeeter Fowler, Grand Saline, Texas, five bass, 20-7, $2,222
4th: Justin O`Brian Cooper, Pelican, La., five bass, 19-1, $1,345
5th: Victor Hawkins, Sugar Land, Texas, five bass, 18-15, $1,153
6th: Brandon Thrash, Downsville, La., five bass, 17-12, $1,057
7th: Bobby Vice, Groves, Texas, five bass, 17-10, $961
8th: Jeff Wooldridge, Chandler, Texas, five bass, 17-9, $865
9th: Keith Suire Jr, DeRidder, La., five bass, 17-7, $769
10th: Richard Ballard, Sulphur, La., five bass, 17-2, $673
Scotty Villiness of Ponca, Arkansas, caught a bass weighing 8 pounds, 13 ounces – the heaviest of the event in the Boater Division – and earned the day’s Boater Big Bass award of $940.
Ben Faucheaux of Natchitoches, Louisiana, won the Co-angler Division and $2,883 Sunday after catching a five-bass limit weighing 17 pounds, 15 ounces.
The top 10 co-anglers were:
1st: Ben Faucheaux, Natchitoches, La., five bass, 17-15, $2,883
2nd: Ronnie Talbot, Mexia, Texas, five bass, 17-4, $1,441
3rd: Robert Royal, Vidor, Texas, five bass, 16-9, $1,430
4th: Jacob Brown, Center Point, La., five bass, 14-12, $673
5th: Christopher Chautin, Zwolle, La., five bass, 14-3, $577
6th: Carl Broussard, Logansport, La., five bass, 13-12, $504
6th: Fred Martin, North Little Rock, Ark., five bass, 13-12, $604
8th: Jeffrey Grubbs, Goodrich, Texas, five bass, 13-6, $408
8th: Skye Ball, Lumberton, Texas, five bass, 13-6, $408
10th: Stetson Overton, Irving, Texas, five bass, 13-2, $306
10th: Tanner Mizell, Many, La., five bass, 13-2, $356
10th: Cedric Jackson, Sicily Island, La., five bass, 13-2, $356
Royal caught the largest bass in the Co-angler Division – a 7-pound, 5-ounce fish. The catch earned him the day’s Co-angler Big Bass award of $470.
Sunday’s rescheduled T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) Cowboy Division event on Sam Rayburn Reservoir was hosted by the Jasper County Development District.
The top 45 boaters and co-anglers in the region based on point standings, along with the five winners in each qualifying event, will be entered in the Oct. 25-27 BFL Regional Championship on Lake of the Ozarks in Osage Beach, Missouri. Boaters will compete for a top award of a Ranger Z518C with a 200-horsepower Evinrude outboard and $20,000, while co-anglers will fish for a new Ranger Z518C with a 200-horsepower Evinrude outboard.
The 2018 BFL is a 24-division circuit devoted to weekend anglers, with 128 tournaments throughout the season, five qualifying events in each division. The top 45 boaters and co-anglers from each division, along with the five winners of the qualifying events, will advance to one of six regional tournaments where they are competing to finish in the top six, which then qualifies them for one of the longest-running championships in all of competitive bass fishing – the BFL All-American. The 2018 BFL All-American will be held May 31-June 2 at Cross Lake in Shreveport, Louisiana, and is hosted by the Shreveport-Bossier Sports Commission. Top performers in the BFL can move up to the Costa FLW Series or even the FLW Tour.
About FLW
FLW is the world’s largest tournament-fishing organization, providing anglers of all skill levels the opportunity to compete for millions in prize money in 2018 across five tournament circuits. Headquartered in Benton, Kentucky, with offices in Minneapolis, FLW and their partners conduct 286 bass-fishing tournaments annually around the world, including the United States, Canada, China, Italy, South Korea, Mexico, Portugal, South Africa and Spain. FLW tournament fishing can be seen on the Emmy-nominated “FLW” television show, broadcast to more than 564 million households worldwide, while FLW Bass Fishing magazine delivers cutting-edge tips from top pros.
By: Brian Johnson, FLW
