Georgetown College wins FLW College Fishing event on Kentucky/Barkley lakes

Duo of Elliott, Timperio snare Central Conference title, $5,000 first-place prize

The top-five team finishers at the National Guard FLW College Fishing event on Kentucky/Barkley lakes acknowledge the crowd shortly after final weigh-in.

May 12, 2012 • MLF • Abu Garcia College Fishing

GILBERTSVILLE, Ky. – The Georgetown College team of Clay Elliott of Pikeville, Ky., and Vincent Timperio of Corbin, Ky., won the National Guard FLW College Fishing Central Conference event on Kentucky/Barkley lakes Saturday with five bass weighing 19 pounds, 1 ounce. The victory earned the team $5,000. The win also helped them advance to the Central Conference Championship.

“We actually didn’t get to do any pre-fishing,” said Elliot, who will start his senior year in accounting at Georgetown College next fall. “We had our GPS loaded with a bunch of spots and had to stop short of our first stop this morning when we met a barge. We decided to stop the boat right where we were and started fishing the point of a canal on Barkley Lake to avoid the barge waves.

“We started throwing topwater baits, Lucky Craft Sammy and Gunfish, and started catching solid bass that didn’t stop. We had our limit by 8 a.m. I had a blast!

Elliott and Timperio have been fishing as a team for the past three years and until today had not qualified for a FLW Conference Championship.

“We had to fish completely different from what we had planned,” said Timperio, who will be a senior in business marketing. “We started throwing topwater baits right away and were pretty surprised at how well we did with them.

“I caught the 7-pounder,” Timperio continued. “I saw it chasing shad and figured I could get it to bite. It was like a big explosion when it hit my bait. The bass jumped out of the water and then we knew how big it really was. I had just lost a 4-pounder on my previous cast so landing this was redemption for the one I lost. It feels nice to finally make a conference championship.”

Rounding out the top five teams and also advancing to the Central Conference Championship are:

2nd: Indiana University – Dustin Vaal, Bloomington, Ind., and Steven Bressler, Fremont, Ind. (five bass, 16-0, $1,500)

3rd: Purdue University – Nicholas Schuetz, Loogootee, Ind., and Elliot Myers, Anderson, Ind. (five bass, 14-1, $1,000)

4th: Western Kentucky University – Andy Southard, Hanson, Ky., and Cody Napier, Lewisburg, Ky. (five bass, 13-9, $1,000)

5th: Murray State University – Vincent Campisano and Chad Branham, both of Murray, Ky. (five bass, 13-0, $1,000)

Four regular-season qualifying events are held in each conference – Central, Northern, Southeastern, Southern and Western. The top five teams from each qualifying tournament will advance to one of five televised three-day National Guard FLW College Fishing Conference Championships, where the first-place team wins a Ranger 177TR bass boat with a 90-horsepower Evinrude or Mercury outboard. The top five teams from each conference championship advance to the national championship.

College Fishing is free to enter and FLW provides boats and drivers for each competing team along with travel allowances. All participants must be registered, full-time undergraduate students at a four-year college or university and members of a fishing club recognized by their college or university.

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