Point Blank
Wisconsin angler Doug Blank rallies from third place to capture the 2006 TBF Northern Divisional Championship on Lake Winnebago
OSHKOSH, Wis. – In the high-octane world of tournament bass fishing, championships are often won and lost by high-stakes gambles. However, in Wisconsin, the site of The Bass Federation Northern Divisional Championship, the decision to roll the dice has even added significance for anglers.
Under state law, anglers have to play by a no-cull rule, so anything that goes in the livewell stays in the livewell. And nobody knows that better than Derek Cummings.
Cummings, who led the first and second day on Lake Winnebago, threw back his fifth keeper, a 2 1/2-pound smallmouth, in the hopes of landing a bigger bass later in the day. But unfortunately for Cummings, his five-fish championship limit never came to fruition.
Cummings ended the day with a frustrating fourth-fish catch and a second-place finish with a total weight of 35 pounds, 2 ounces, just 2 pounds, 6 ounces behind winner Doug Blank of of Fort Atkinson, Wis.
“I told myself I wasn’t going to keep anything under 3 pounds. I already had four in the boat. Three were about 14 1/2 inches and the fourth was around 2 1/2 pounds,” recalled Cummings, an electrician from Eaton Rapids, Mich. “I’m not at all sorry I did that. It was a chance I was willing to take because I knew in order to win, I needed some better fish.”
Blank also gambled and threw back several keepers early in the day, but he managed to catch a 13-pound, 11-ounce limit. For his effort, he won the Catrol Maximum Performer award, a $500 gift card from Wal Mart. He threw the same bait, a white swim jig to the same submerged reef he fished the first and second day. Blank caught about 15 bass total, most by 8 a.m.
However, it wasn’t easy. According to Blank, he had four fish in his livewell early but then the bite suddenly dried up.
“I didn’t get anything between 8 and 10:30 a.m. I was starting to get a little nervous because the action had been better in the morning,” said Blank. “I finally caught my final keeper around noon.”
After throwing his fifth fish back into the water, Cummings said he hooked into several quality fish later in the day, including at least one that might have weighed 3 pounds. But unfortunately, he wasn’t able to boat any of them.
Cummings said that he threw a four-inch green pumpkin tube with a smoke and purple flake tail rigged on a 5/16-ounce jig head.
Best of the rest
Illinois angler Scott McIntyre of Decatur, Ill., leapfrogged from seventh place to third place in today’s competition with a final weight of 29 pounds, 15 ounces. His four-fish bag weighed 9 pounds, 11 ounces.
“I spent all three days just hitting a bunch of small pieces of cover. I’d catch one off a stump or a log, another off some isolated grass. I was all over the place,” he said.
McIntyre caught the majority of his bass, both largemouths and smallmouths, on a Chatterbait. He also caught some by flipping a watermelon jig with a green pumpkin trailer to isolated cover. This was his fifth divisional event, but it will be his first time he has qualified for the TBF Championship.
Two Indiana anglers tied for fourth place with identical weights of 29 pounds, 6 ounces. Aaron Ivy, who fished as a non-boater and remained seated in second place on the first and second days of the tournament, only brought in two keepers to the weigh-in stage today. Quinn Hoyer, a boater, brought in a 9-pound, 7-ounce limit and finished with 29 pounds, 6 ounces as well. However, under TBF rules, the angler with the most fish for the entire event will represent his state as a boater at the National Championship. Ivy weighed 12 bass while Hoyer brought in 13.
Michigan angler Eric Smith had the big bass of the day. It weighed 4 pounds, 5 ounces.
Final team standings
The 12-man Wisconsin Bass Federation team blew away their competition with a combined weight of 271 pounds, 7 ounces. Illinois was a distant second with 224 pounds, 10 ounces, followed by Indiana, Michigan and Ohio.
The anglers representing their state at the TBF Championship next spring (boaters are listed first) are Doug Blank and Jim Jones from Wisconsin; Scott McIntyre and Jeff Moffett from Illinois; Quinn Hoyer and Aaron Ivy from Indiana; Derek Cummings and Jon Jezierski from Michigan; and Jeff Melsop and Kevin Wells from Ohio.
The TBF Northern Divisional championship, hosted by the Oshkosh Visitor and Convention Bureau and the Wisconsin Bass Federation, is presented by The National Guard.