Mike Sinitiere, Wednesday Night Hawg Fight Bass Tournament Series founder, and others watch as some of the big bass are weighed during the Wednesday Night Hawg Fight Bass Tournament Series.

LOREAUVILLE — Who was going to win the tussle, the sizeable bass tangled in the duck blind or the bass angler on the other end of the fishing line Wednesday evening?

The answer was up in the air, literally and figuratively, for a few anxious moments because the bass had two chances to get away from Brandon Sellers of New Iberia, who had pitched a baby Brush Hog inside the duck blind in the last hour of the Wednesday Night Hawg Fight Bass Tournament Series tournament on Lake Fausse Pointe.

New Iberian Johnny Schexnayder, up front on the trolling motor, did his best to help get the fish in the boat with some timely maneuvers and did.

“It had him around the duck blind on a piece of wood. I got it out and it got in the duck blind again. The head of the fish was out of the water. I unwrapped the line from a nail on the duck blind and Brandon pulled it away. I netted it right on the edge of the boat,” Schexnayder said.

“Brandon was excited. He was real nervous. He didn’t yell but I don’t think he cast for two or three minutes,” he said.

“I don’t know about all that. (But) it pumps you up, you know, when you catch a good fish. I was as excited as anybody else catching a big bass. You talk a little smack in the back of the boat,” Sellers said, chuckling.

Safely in the livewell, that 4.8-pound bass helped them win their second straight WN Hawg Fight BTS tournament out of Marsh Field Boat Landing. Schexnayder and Sellers wowed the crowd, and there was a crowd with a 31-boat field, with a three-fish limit weighing 10.06 pounds. First place was worth $620.

It was a showdown of heavy “bags” down the stretch. The winners had to have 10-plus pounds to finish ahead of the hard-fishing team of brothers, Ben Suit and Zach Suit, both of New Iberia.

The Suits checked in with three bass weighing 9.31 pounds, including a solid 4-pound class bass that was in the running for big bass honors for a few minutes. They won $372 with their strong second-place finish.

New Iberia bass anglers Max Stevens and Tim Worsham challenged the runners-up with their own three-fish limit, one that weighed 8.78 pounds for $248.

The biggest bass was brought to the scale by Keith Price of New Iberia, who fished with his nephew, Dan Price. (See related story on this page.) Their 4.98-pounder just nipped the 4.8-pounder carried to the scale by Schexnayder, 65, and Sellers, 47.

“I thought we had a shot at big bass until Keith Price pulled that out. I was a little disappointed. But I was glad for Keith. I was happy for Keith,” he said.

Their 4.8 was their last fish on an outing in which they didn’t have one keeper bass in the first hour of fishing.

“We didn’t have anything until 7:10. After that, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam,” Sellers, who has owned Sellers Sheet Metal in Opelousas since 2001, said, noting that a falling lake level forced them to fish an area they weren’t planning to fish.

“It waås more of a scouting trip, which is probably why we caught that fish (their biggest of the evening). Usually, you don’t catch a fish like that in a tournament. It gets away,” he said. “When we picked that last one up, I said, ‘We’re going to collect.’”

Schexnayder, who is retired from Orion Chemicals, agreed and said, “We got lucky. We needed that.

“I tell you what, the fishing was tough. We caught like six fish and didn’t catch a fish the first hour. Three in the cypress trees and three in the duck blinds.”

They caught on Brush Hogs and Chatterbaits, he said, proud of their second straight victory.

“It’s hard. There’s a lot of luck involved. It’s what I like to do, just go out there and fish, just make as many casts as I can in two hours,” Sellers said.

Before Wednesday’s mini bass tournament, Schexnayder said, “I told Brandon if we could win two the whole year that’d be an achievement. I’ve looked back over the years and all anybody won was two. They might come out second or third but the most they’d win was two.”

Can Schexnayder and Sellers win the title?

“We’re going to try our best. We’ve got a good start,” Schexnayder said.

He is enjoying the new circuit, he said, noting every dollar was accounted for before the 5:30 p.m. start at Marsh Field Boat landing.

“Those guys are running that tournament right. You saw the prize money for that before the tournament,” he said, “and they’re keeping money for the Classic.”

The next WN Hawg Fight BTS contest is April 25 out of Marsh Field Boat Landing. Entry fee, which is $60 per boat, must be paid before 1 p.m. April 25 at Cajun Guns and Tackle.