East Hall Wins on Lake Lanier

The East Hall High School duo of Tristan Thomas and Dakota Crumley from Gainesville, Georgia, brought a five-bass limit to the scale Saturday weighing 12 pounds, 3 ounces, to win the 2015 TBF/FLW High School Fishing Southeastern Conference Championship tournament on Lake Lanier in Gainesville, Georgia. The win earned the team the title of Southeastern Conference champions and advanced the team to the 2016 High School Fishing National Championship, held next spring at a location yet to be announced in conjunction with the TBF National Championship and a Walmart FLW Tour event.

A field of 51 teams from eight states qualified to compete in this conference championship. Fifteen of the 45 teams that entered the tournament brought five-bass limits to the scale.

The winning East Hall High duo said that they concentrated on fishing blowdowns for the majority of the day with a green-pumpkin Reaction Innovations Flirt Worm rigged on a shaky head to catch the majority of their fish.

The top five teams on Lake Lanier that advanced to the 2016 High School Fishing National Championship were:

  1st:       East Hall High School, Gainesville, Ga. – Tristan Thomas and Dakota Crumley, (five bass, 12-3)

  2nd:      Hazel Green High School, Hazel Green, Ala. – Zeke Gossett and Ryan Shields, (five bass, 12-2)

  3rd:       Evans High School, Evans, Ga. – Blake Stephenson and Tyler Matthews, (five bass, 11-15)

  4th:       Berkeley High School, Moncks Corner, S.C. – Eric Glenn and Nathan McPherson, (five bass, 11-7)

  4th:       Abbeville High School, Abbeville, S.C. –Daelyn Whaley and Carter McNeil, (five bass, 11-7)

Rounding out the top 10 teams were:

  6th:       Madisonville North Hopkins High School, Madisonville, Ky. – Alex Tomblinson and Hunter Purdy, (five bass, 11-2)

  7th:       Headland High School, Headland, Ala. –Cole Burdeshaw and Jacob Hartzog, (five bass, 10-13)

  8th:       Georgia Student Angler Federation – Nathan Ragsdale, Fayetteville, Ga., and Joshua Bennett, Kennesaw, Ga.,(five bass, 10-12)

  9th:       Auburndale High School, Auburndale, Fla. – Jackson Williams and Bryce Goff, (five bass, 10-7)

  10th:     Dickson County High School, Dickson, Tenn. – Dylan Dunnagan and Shader Brown, (five bass, 10-3)

Complete results and photos from the event can be found at HighSchoolFishing.org.