MILAM, Texas — A Coteau bass angler loves the fact that Toledo Bend gives Teche Area fishermen a chance to catch bragging-size bass such as the two “hawgs” weighed in during the Coteau Bass Hustlers tournament April 20-21.

Colby Hebert, 22, had one of them on the second day. It weighed 7.11 pounds, a little less than the one caught the day before, an 8.4-ounce lunker, by Damon Bowers of Splendora, Texas.

“Oh, I mean, that’s two really good fish. It’s pretty good for a small (bass) club to go over there and catch fish like that,” Hebert said Friday night.

It was his first chance to talk about his big bass because he was offshore the week following the tournament and again late this past week. He still was fired up about it and the good showing by fellow bass club members.

“Everybody in the club actually had some really good weights over there. Everybody thought they had a chance. Toledo Bend really showed itself, both days,” he said.

After Bowers and his son, Blaine, rode the gigantic bass he caught April 20 to a tournament win with five bass weighing 17.2 pounds, Hebert and his father, Marlin Hebert, who said he has fished tournaments with his dad since he was about 5 and joined the bass club at 16, went out for the second tournament the next day and headed to Six Mile Creek.

The Heberts had one small keeper bass in the livewell and their pattern had dissipated, the younger Hebert said.

“We spent the first part of the morning hitting deeper points. Then we started beating the banks like we know how to do,” he said.

He was casting a white Zoom soft plastic frog and put it under a flooded bush.

“As soon as it came out of the bush, a fish boiled on it. When it first hit I didn’t realize it had the frog in its mouth. I looked down in the water. That fish was running to the boat. It was so clear I saw the frog was in its mouth. I set the hook,” he said.

“My dad ran to the front of the boat. We couldn’t really tell how big it was the way it hit it,” he said. “As soon as I set the hook, she swam and jumped out of the water. That’s when I said, ‘This is a monster.’

“Luckily, it wasn’t too far from the boat. I got her coming to the boat and when she got around the boat she jumped again. The frog, the hook, everything came out of the fish’s mouth. Right when it came out, dad put the net under the fish and caught it. It was definitely a team effort on that fish.”

The catch triggered a subdued celebration.

“We were both really excited and jumping around the boat. But we were trying to contain ourselves, which is hard to do when you put close to an 8-pound fish in the boat,” he said.

“After we took a couple pictures of the fish, put the fish in the livewell and caught one more fish to give us three fish. That (third keeper bass) was out last,” he said.

The biggest bass of his bass fishing career — his previous record was a 7-pound, 1-ounce bass caught four years ago at Toledo Bend — was released alive after the weigh-in, he said.

“It swam away fine,” he said.