VIDALIA, Miss. – Heading into this Saturday’s Championship Round of the 2018 Lucas Oil Challenge Cup on Louisiana’s Larto Lake, one angler in particular seems to have his lower Mississippi River Valley pattern dialed in: two-time MLF winner Kevin VanDam.

In his two rounds of competition on the Black River-Cocodrie Lake Complex and Lake Bruin, VanDam has logged 25 scorable bass for 39 pounds, 15 ounces of combined weight. Of that, though, he’s caught 20 fish and 29-12 on one bait: a Strike King KVD 1.5 squarebill in River Shiner.

“This is just one of my best confidence baits, and a bait I know I can go anywhere in the country where fish are shallow and get bit,” VanDam said. “I’ve won a lot of money on this particular bait. In my gut, I feel like cranking is the best way to locate fish as fast as possible and get off to a good start, no matter where they put us (to fish).”

VanDam was slow out of the gate in his Elimination Round, failing to weigh in his first scorable bass until nearly 90 minutes had passed in the first period. Once he hooked that fish, though, it gave him the information he needed to ride the cranking bite to a third-place finish: VanDam would eventually catch 11 more fish for 18-3 in that round, cranking the KVD 1.5 around isolated wood laying just off the bank.

He mixed it up a little with a swimbait, worm and jig in his Sudden Death Round, but still caught eight of his 13 scorable fish on the squarebill in claiming the last of eight spots in the championship. And with a potential third MLF title in eight Championship Rounds ahead of him, don’t expect VanDam to stray too far from the cranking formula.

“You put us on a shallow fishery this time of year in this format, and I’m fishing a squarebill,” VanDam admits. “I’ll have other options on deck, but I think that 1.5 is going to be a big key for me.”