Hawg Fight winners Girouard, Vannoy stay close to catch limit

Published 11:00 am Tuesday, July 29, 2025

MYETTE POINTE – Two Lafayette area bass anglers probably spent more time bass fishing on July 23 than any other bassers fishing the 10th Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series tournament of 2025.

“We fished the four points right at the landing and went nowhere else,” Jeremy Girouard said, referring to Myette Point Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin.

Instead of running near or far in his red Ranger aluminum bass boat, the Broussard bass angler and his tournament partner, Garet Vannoy of Youngsville, spent just about every minute fishing from 5:30 p.m. up to weigh-in time at 8:30 p.m. During the first five minutes Vannoy reeled in a 2-pounder and a 3 ¼-pound class bass on the team’s way to winning the mini-bass tournament with a three-bass limit weighing 6.59 pounds worth $450.

Girouard, project manager at Accurate Measurement Controls Inc., said he didn’t prefish. Vannoy went out the day before, he said, caught a couple bass around there and a few bass in Crew Boat Chute.

“I told him (Vannoy) before we got there (to the boat ramp), we ain’t going anywhere,” Girouard said.

“I don’t know. There really was no magic to it. I decided to stay close. We rotated all the points right there. In fact, Garet could have won it in those first five minutes. He had another good one he brought to the top but it came off,” he said.

And, for a while, that was that. The bite shut off.

“I thought we were going to catch them all afternoon,” Girouard said with a laugh.

During the last 30 minutes before weigh-in, however, he caught two 13-inch class bass and the biggest one filled their limit. And on one of the four points, he said, spotted bass moved up and they caught eight of them in the waning minutes.

Girouard and Vannoy, manager at Billeaud’s Grocery in Broussard, caught the bass flippin’ purple “beaver-style” soft plastic creature baits. The bass were on the sandy points, in the current itself and not up on the banks, according to Girouard.

“I thought we had about 5 ½ pounds. Them river fish, they’re chunky,” he said.

It was his first-ever WN Hawg Fights BTS win, although he has registered some seconds and thirds on the popular local evening bass fishing circuit. He has his share of evening bass tournament wins at Henderson Lake, however, where he fishes with either his daughter, Lily, or Vannoy.

“Oh, I’m used to it,” Girouard said about notching an evening tournament W.

But, he added quickly, “Oh, Garet was pumped up!”

Vannoy, whose 3.30-pound bass in the first five minutes was the tournament’s biggest bass worth $100, has been unable to chase bass as much this year, Girouard said, because he and his wife, Ainsley, became the proud parents of their second child – a baby girl, Kennedy Rose, who was born Christmas Day 2025.

Andre Weber, left, and Hunter Neuville grip the lip of three bass they caught July 23 in the 10th Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament contest of 2025. Weber and Neuville finished a close second with 6.39 pounds.
DON SHOOPMAN / THE DAILY IBERIAN

It was a tight race for top dollar on that searing hot evening. Hunter Neuville and Andre Weber were able to team up again, go out and come back with a limit that fell just short of the winning weight. Neuville and Weber, who have come on strong down the stretch to vie for the WN Hawg Fights BTS Angler of the Year title, won $270 with three bass weighing 6.39 pounds.

Ryan Latch of Lafayette and John Pecoraro of Youngsville were just a little off the pace set by the frontrunners. Their limit tipped the digital scale to 5.89 pounds for $180.

WN Hawg Fights BTS director Rusty Owens, right, and his wife, Felicia, relax in his air-conditioned pickup truck while taking entry fees July 23 for the season’s 10th Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series. The heat was on that afternoon with a heat index of around 106 at Myette Point Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin.
DON SHOOPMAN / THE DAILY IBERIAN

Twenty boats entered the circuit’s second tournament of the year in the Spillway.

The 11th and next-to-last Hawg Fight of the season is scheduled to be held Aug. 6 at Myette Pointe Landing. The regular-season finale is Aug. 20 and the WN Hawg Fights BTS Classic is Sept. 7.

Girouard said he is looking forward to the Classic.

“I’m just not looking forward to the heat,” he said with another soft laugh.

Weighmaster Wilfred “Tuppy” Gary, right, hands two keeper bass back to Donald Romero Sr. at the weigh-in July 23 for the 10th WN Hawg Fights BTS tournament of 2025. Bass anglers in 20 boats participated in the tournament held out of Myette Boat Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin.
DON SHOOPMAN / THE DAILY IBERIAN

Gavin Savoy steers his aluminum boat to the dock at Myette Point Landing to pick up his WN Hawg Fights BTS tournament partner, Austin Theriot, before the start of the Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series tournament in the Atchafalaya Basin. Twenty boats entered the tournament.
DON SHOOPMAN / THE DAILY IBERIAN

Jacob Shoopman, foreground, steers his Ranger 198RT powered by a 150-h.p. Mercury outboard motor along the G.A. Cut while two other Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series anglers, Austin Theriot and Gavin Savoy, at the tiller, head to their destination after the takeoff July 23 from Myette Point Landing.
DON SHOOPMAN / THE DAILY IBERIAN