Bringing home the boat

HUNTERSVILLE, N.C. – Now that the cutoff has been made, the five teams of finalists can breath easy knowing they have punched their ticket to next April’s College Fishing National Championship. What is left to decide is who takes home the new Ranger boat and $25,000.

Currently in the top spot is the Virginia Tech team of Andrew Blevins and Carson Rejzer. They own a 3-pound lead over their Virginia Tech teammates Charlie Machek and Scott Wiley.

All week long Blevins has been drop-shotting a 4 1/2-inch Roboworm in Ehrler’s Edge color. His partner Rejzer has been mixing it up with a shaky head and 3/8-ounce homemade football jig with a Strike King Rage Craw trailer. On day one the jig worked well for Rejzer. On day two he was forced to downsize.

“There was a local tournament up the lake over the weekend, and the fish really got pounded,” said Blevins. “Hopefully those fish have recovered, because we’ll have those spots all to ourselves.”

Blevins and Rejzer are the only team that has caught a six-bass limit each day. They hope that trend continues today.

“I think if we catch 7 or 8 pounds, we’ll be all right,” added Blevins. “I want another limit, but I’d be happy with four or five fish. I think those first two limits really set us apart from the field.”

Machek and Wiley have two docks that they start on each morning. Within minutes they know if the bite is on or off.

“When these docks are on, we can catch three or four fish real quick,” said Machek. “Hopefully they are on, because 3 pounds is tough to overcome on Lake Norman.”

Another team to watch out for is North Carolina State. Ben Dziwulski and Kevin Beverley caught a 9-pound, 2-ounce stringer yesterday and are confident they can improve that today.

“Our spots are really productive,” said Beverley. “All we need is 10 to 15 minutes of them being active, and we can catch 12 pounds. With a little bit of cloud cover today, it could be interesting. We’re due for a big bag.”

The top five FLW College Fishing teams from each of the four regular-season Northern Division tournaments gained automatic entry into the 2009 Northern Regional Championship at Davidson College. During the three-day regional event, 20 two-man collegiate angling teams compete for a top award of $25,000 plus a 177TR Ranger wrapped in school colors and powered by an Evinrude or Yamaha outboard engine.

Logistics

Today’s final weigh-in, which is free and open to the public, will begin at 4 p.m. at Davidson College. The winning team is determined by the cumulative weight from all three competition days.

The Reel Life Festival, which has been running in conjunction with the tournament weigh-ins, continues today from 4 to 7 p.m. Reel Life Festival visitors can register today to win a MacBook Air.

Monday’s conditions

Sunrise: 6:53 a.m.

Temperature at takeoff: 50 degrees

Expected high temperature: 70 degrees

Water temperature: 62-66 degrees

Wind: ENE at 2 mph

Max. humidity: 57 percent

Day’s outlook: partly cloudy