Caleb Sumrall shows off two fish he caught at the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Elite at Lake Guntersville in Alabama. Sumrall is in 11th place after two days of the event.

SCOTTSBORO, Alabama — New Iberian Caleb Sumrall, riding a strong start in the Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Elite at Lake Guntersville, is in 11th place with a two-day total of 36 pounds, 2 ounces.

The 32-year-old bass pro easily made the Top 35 cut for the third straight event with his strong effort Saturday following a fast start on Friday, opening day of the sixth Bassmaster Elite tournament of 2019. Sumrall came through in the clutch Saturday with a five-bass limit weighing 16 pounds, 10 ounces, and found something to his liking that was a little different than the patterns most of the other Elites were fishing Friday and Saturday.

Sumrall relied on his flippin’ prowess around grass beds in shallow water to move into position to fish Championship Monday. He did catch two fish on plastic frogs but made his statement with soft plastics that he flipped in the grass on the northern end of Lake Guntersville.

His biggest bass Saturday was a 4-pound, 7-ounce, fish that he caught around 9:10 a.m. He started culling long before noon and benefitted from a 3-4 at 11:35 a.m.

At the weigh-in here Saturday afternoon, Sumrall said he “caught a bunch of fish but no key bites today,” unlike Friday. However, he said, he was around a lot of fish and around a big fish, too, which buoyed his confidence going into Semifinal Sunday.

Sumrall, whose wife, Jacie, and children Clélié and Axel, are here to cheer him on this weekend, and the rest of the Elites are chasing North Carolina bass pro Matt Arey. Arey’s limit on Saturday weighed 21 pounds, 6 ounces, to give him a two-day total of 44 pounds.

Arey’s day started slow. At 10:30 a.m., he had two small keepers swimming in the livewell. A day earlier he had all of his best fish by that time in the morning, he said after the weigh-in.

The halfway leader has a slim lead of Tennessee bass pro Brandon Lester, whose five bass weighed 21 pounds, 7 ounces, to give him a total of 43 pounds, 7 ounces.There was plenty of movement near the top of the leaderboard Saturday. The two biggest bags of the tournament were brought to the scale by Alabama bass pro Kelley Jaye, who moved into sixth place after weighing a 24-pound, 12-ounce, limit for 39-5, and by Texas bass pro Ray Hanselman Jr., whose 24-1 limit pushed him into third place with 40 pounds, 3 ounces.

Sumrall’s goal today is to catch enough big bass to qualify for the championship round on the fourth and final day Monday. The Top 10 is within his reach thanks to a solid two days of bassin’ on the lake that will be the site of the Bassmaster Classic in 2020.

Today’s third round was scheduled to begin at 6 a.m. out of Goose Pond Landing with the weigh-in at 2:15 p.m. at Goose Pond Colony.

Two other Louisiana bass pros made the cut and are fishing today, the third day of the event. Tyler Rivet of Raceland was in 18th at the halfway point with 34.11 pounds while Robbie Latuso of Gonzales was in 24th with 34 pounds, 1 ounce.

Sumrall began his push Friday, the first day of the tournament. At the 2 p.m. weigh-in that day, after culling to a hefty five-fish limit, he had 20 pounds, 4 ounces, and found himself in 13th place going into Saturday.

His was one of many limits weighing more than 16 pounds Friday. In fact, more than half the 74-angler field caught at least 16 pounds and 14 Elites, including Sumrall, had 20 pounds or more to their credit after Day 1.

The first-day leader was Connecticut bass pro Paul Mueller, whose five bass weighed 22 pounds, 14 ounces. Mueller’s fortune changed drastically when he scratched on Saturday.

“I don’t have any excuses. It was just a tough day today,” Mueller said during a live broadcast on www.bassmaster.com a few minutes before weigh-in Saturday.