South Carolina’s Evatt and Gurley take lead on first day at High School Nationals

LA CROSSE, Wis. – The Mississippi River showed out today on Pools 7, 8, and 9 as a wealth of healthy bass were brought in by the 256 boats in the field of anglers at the High School Fishing World Finals and National Championship. Of those teams, 195 brought in a three-fish limit with the average bass weighed hitting right above the 2 1/2-pound mark. Anglers who were able to capitalize on the 2 3/4 to 3-pound bites find themselves in great shape to make a run up the leaderboard on Day 2.

At the very top of the pile come Wednesday evening were South Carolina’s Ethan Evatt and Bryson Gurley of the Palmetto Fishing Team. The pair busted a mixed bag of largemouth and smallmouth for 11 pounds, 3 ounces. They hold a 1-ounce lead over Noah Nguyen and Tyler Peterson of Heritage High School of California. 

“Well, we started off with a limit in the first, say, 15 casts,” Gurley said. “Today was really almost a fish every cast. It slowed down a bit when that current started to change, but we switched things up a bit. Later in the day we got on some largemouth and figured out a pattern with them.”

The boys from Palmetto are mixing things up on their fish, targeting both largemouth and smallmouth all in Pool 8, focusing on both vegetation and hard pieces of cover to garner their bites. The pair also are mixing up presentations, hoping to optimize their bites in the changing conditions.

“I would say we are doing a mixture of both power and finesse fishing for both,” Evatt said. “For largemouth, we are mostly fishing vegetation. For smallmouth, it’s all about the current. It’s all about the angle and all about the current. They’ll bite anything you throw at them really.”

Gurley and Evatt may be a long way from their homes in South Carolina, but they’ve put the time in on the Upper Mississippi to find the right caliber of fish this week. They attribute time on the water as their main key to finding their fish and being able to ensure their bass have stuck around throughout the week.”

“Our home lake is Lake Hartwell,” Gurley said. “This is totally different than Hartwell, it’s unlike anything we’ve ever fished before. We’ve just been out here idling with our side imaging for hours and hours. Our fish have stayed put for five days now, so I think they’ll be there still through the week.”

Gurley added that the development of their Day 1 largemouth pattern could pay big dividends if their fish do happen to relocate on Days 2 and 3.

“We figured out that largemouth pattern late in the day today,” he said. “And honestly, if the smallmouth deal falls apart, we will just go largemouth fishing. We are finding new largemouth spots every day.”