Culleoka’s Andrews Earns Co-angler Title
Daniel Johnson of Lebanon, Tennessee, brought five bass weighing 18 pounds, 7 ounces, to the scale Saturday to win the T-H Marine FLW Bass Fishing League (BFL) Music City Division tournament on Old Hickory Lake presented by Navionics. Johnson took home $3,418 for his victory.
“I caught my fish on the upper end of the lake,” said Johnson, who earned his first career-win in FLW competition. “They were all from isolated wood – the bigger the wood, the better. I focused on bass in 1 to 3 feet of water and caught 11 keepers throughout the day.”
Johnson said he used tubes and beaver-style baits with a 5/8-ounce Jenko Fishing Creature Weight to catch his fish, and that he preferred black-and-blue and green-pumpkin colors.
“I had a limit early, but after the sun poked through I culled four of them out,” said Johnson. “The sunshine concentrated bass in the cover, which made them more predictable. I could hit the high-percentage areas and skip a lot more water. Everything just seemed to align with how I was fishing.”
The top 10 boaters finished the tournament in:
1st: Daniel Johnson, Lebanon, Tenn., five bass, 18-7, $3,418
2nd: Dwight Fox, Gainesboro, Tenn., five bass, 17-4, $1,909
3rd: Jason Lee, Baxter, Tenn., five bass, 14-9, $1,138
4th: Hunter Bouldin, McMinnville, Tenn., five bass, 13-12, $898
5th: Beau Grissim, Lebanon, Tenn., five bass, 13-11, $684
6th: John Hopkins, Hendersonville, Tenn., five bass, 13-3, $627
7th: Rodney Allen, Clarkrange, Tenn., five bass, 13-2, $570
8th: Terry Steele, Sparta, Tenn., five bass, 12-7, $933
9th: Steve Whitaker, Scottsville, Ky., five bass, 12-5, $456
10th: Josh Tramel, Smithville, Tenn., five bass, 12-0, $399
Steele caught a 5-pound, 13-ounce bass – the heaviest of the event in the Boater Division – and earned the day’s Boater Big Bass award of $420.
Jaylen Andrews of Culleoka, Tennessee, won the Co-angler Division and $1,709 Saturday after catching three bass weighing 11 pounds, 15 ounces.
The top 10 co-anglers were:
1st: Jaylen Andrews, Culleoka, Tenn., three bass, 11-15, $1,709
2nd: John Davenport, Huntsville, Ala., five bass, 9-6, $712
2nd: Joey Myers, Gallatin, Tenn., five bass, 9-6, $912
4th: Matthew Bouldin, Smithville, Tenn., five bass, 8-11, $399
5th: Greg O’Neal, Winchester, Tenn., four bass, 8-8, $342
6th: Edward Lovely, Manchester, Tenn., three bass, 7-12, $363
7th: Roland Wade, Rocky Face, Ga., three bass, 6-15, $285
8th: Mark Wedan, Freetown, Ind., three bass, 6-11, $256
9th: Corey Poss, Smithville, Tenn., two bass, 6-10, $438
10th: Joey D’Andrea, Knoxville, Tenn., three bass, 6-7, $199
Poss caught the largest bass in the Co-angler Division – a fish weighing 4 pounds, 13 ounces. The catch earned him the day’s Co-angler Big Bass award of $210.
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. 12-14 BFL Regional Championship on Wheeler Lake in Decatur, Alabama. 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 2017 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. 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 2017 across five tournament circuits. Headquartered in Benton, Kentucky, with offices in Minneapolis, FLW conducts more than 258 bass-fishing tournaments annually across the United States and sanctions tournaments in Canada, China, Mexico, South Africa and South Korea. 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
