Delahoussaye, Bulliard win with 5.23 lbs.

Published 6:00 am Sunday, July 15, 2018

MYETTE POINT — Rain was pouring and the water was rising, neither which prevented two veteran St. Martinville bassers from winning the eighth Wednesday Night Hawg Fight Bass Tournament Series contest Wednesday night in the Atchafalaya Basin.

Carroll Delahoussaye and Danny Bulliard scraped a limit together, even culled, to post the victory. The winners caught six bass, five goggle-eye and a sac-a-lait bigger than their second-largest bass, Bulliard said with a chuckle.

“He would have weighed in second in our stringer. And the goggle-eye were big, too,” he said Thursday morning.

They caught their fish on “three different baits — topwater, underwater (crank baits) and on the bottom (plastic worm),” he said.

The eighth stop on the local mini bass tournament tour attracted 21 boats.

It was a close call at the scale at Myette Point Boat Landing. Delahoussaye and Bulliard needed all 5.23 pounds to claim the first-place prize of $420.

Mike Sinitiere of New Iberia and Brooke Morrison of Broussard, who won the regular-season title in 2017, finished a close second with three bass weighing 5 pounds for $252.

Leonard “T-Clyde” Norbert of New Iberia and Darrell Mitchell of St. Martinville teamed up for a third-place showing with two bass weighing 3.56 pounds worth $168. They also had the evening’s biggest bass, a 3.56-pounder that netted them another $210.

Mitchell caught the “hawg” on a buzz bait after his fishing buddy buzzed one through the same area.

“I threw a buzz bait, like in an alley in the cypress trees. He threw right behind me and the fish exploded on the buzz bait. He (Mitchell) said, ‘You just threw there!’ ” Norbert said.

“We just couldn’t get that third one (keeper). Just one good keeper is all we needed” to win the eighth WN Hawg Fight BTS of 2018, he said.

Bulliard and Delahoussaye had their three, which was enough.

“It was the least amount of fish caught (to win a WN Hawg Fight BTS) in the Basin and we won, barely. When the water goes up, they just quit biting. I don’t know why,” Bulliard said.

Bulliard, plant manager at Cajun Chef Products in St. Martinville, said the key to putting bass in the boat when the water’s on a hard rise is to look for spots where the water can’t go into the woods.

“Find a place where the banks are there and maybe the first there didn’t leave down the river,” he said.

With three tournaments remaining, hard-fishing brothers Ben Suit and Zach Suit, both of New Iberia, own the top spot in the standings with 677 points. 

The co-leaders are being hard-pressed down the stretch by Brandon Sellers, who has 642 points, followed by his fishing partner, Johnny Schexnayder, 637, and Norbert and Mitchell, 622.

n WEDNESDAY NIGHT 

HAWG FIGHT BASS 

TOURNAMENT SERIES

Point Standings through tournament No. 8

(Top 20)

1, Ben Suit-Zach Suit, 677. 2, Brandon Sellers, 642. 3, Johnny Schexnayder, 637. 4, Darrell Mitchel-Leonard “T-Clyde” Norris, 622. 5, Don Shoopman-Jacob Shoopman, 562. 6, Jean Trahan, 490. 7, Chris Vedrines, 557. 8, Ronnie Dressel, 552. 9, Luke Bulliard, 521. 10, Mike Sinitiere, 509. 11, Brad Romero, 502. 12, (tie) Vic Segura and Wilen Broussard, 500. 14, Alex Lassalle, 496. 15, (tie) Carroll Delahoussaye and Danny Bulliard, 494. 17, Mike O’Brien491. 18, (tie) Ben Romero and Luke Romero, 490. 20, Paul Resweber, 472.