Cousins rise to the top with 3-lb. plus average

Published 5:45 am Sunday, March 6, 2022

LOREAUVILLE — Two cousins and close friends had a Legendary day Feb. 26 on Lake Fausse Pointe.

Braxton Resweber and Austin Theriot brought five “grownup” bass, the kind that make Legends, to the scale after a cold morning start and mild day for the 7th annual Legends on the Lake tournament held out of Marsh Field Boat Landing. Their theme for the day was “fun.”

“Ah, we always have fun. That’s what it’s all about. When you fish with somebody you have fun with, good things happen. It felt good. It was fun. It’s a fun tournament to get the year started,” the 25-year-old Resweber said after he and his cousin topped a 31-boat field with a stout five-bass limit weighing 16.19 pounds.

Their payday was worth $570, plus two handsome plaques shaped like the Sportsman’s Paradise. It was Resweber’s second plaque, having won the inaugural Legends on the Lake tournament in 2015 with Randal Savoy of Catahoula, and Theriot’s first.

“That’s a pretty plaque. I tell you what, it’s on the wall right now” Theriot said Monday evening, proud to get his first one.

The winning team caught 30-35 keeper bass mostly on bladed jigs and wacky worms, mostly, and at the end on spinnerbaits.

Their win came against some of the better bass anglers across Acadiana who fished the Sunset-based Atchafalaya Hawg Hunters Bass Club tournament, one of the first majors of the season in the Teche Area.

Lee Bordelon Jr. and Jarod Green finished runners-up with five bass weighing 14.92 pounds for $380.

Veteran Lafayette area bass anglers Greer Billeaud and Paul Begnaud were third with a limit tipping the scale at 14.66 worth $240. Their bag was highlighted by the day’s biggest bass, a 5.03-pounder hooked and landed by Begnaud worth another $210.

New Iberian Bo Amy, the defending Legends on the Lake champion, grabbed the fourth payout slot with five bass weighing 13.44 pounds for $160. His catch last year in the Legends tournament weighed a whopping 21.36 pounds.

Conditions going into this year’s contest differed compared to last year. Lake Fausse Pointe has been unseasonably low for at least three months and the average water temp has been cooler than usual.

Resweber, 25, and Theriot, who turned 21 on Feb. 16, solved the issue in part by avoiding the popular and overfished spring spawning hotspot of Sandy Cove off Bird Island Chute. The team is fresh from winning a hard-earned Angler(s) of the Year title in the highly competitive 2021 Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament Series.

“The water was too low for Sandy Cove. Nah. We weren’t going in Sandy Cove, not in a bass boat. We didn’t need to go in there,” said Theriot, who finishes his South Louisiana Community College studies in aviation mechanics this month, crawfishes commercially, and also helps at his father’s business, T&T Asphalt Co. Inc.

Theriot credited his cousin for finding the winning pattern the day before the tournament in the borrow pit area. His cousin stuck a few bass after work the day before, he said.

“I didn’t get to do much scouting. Friday afternoon I got bit twice so I quit and left. I didn’t know how good it’d be but it turned out real good,” said Resweber, a builder/installer for six years at Cabinets Unlimited Inc.

“We stayed around the borrow pits. We were on a pretty good deal. I don’t like to fish around a lot of people and it (Sandy Cove’s water level) was too low. I’ll go if I think we could win in there. (But) we marked it off the list.”

The next day dawned with the wind chill index in the mid-40s.

Theriot said, “I knew it’d be cold. I wasn’t expecting as much as we did but I knew we were on fish and we’d catch some, catch some good ones and we did. We caught a bunch of good ones.

“I knew we had a good stringer but I didn’t think we had it. I don’t anticipate.”

“I caught 90 percent of my fish on a green pumpkin Chatterbait. Austin was trying different stuff in the back of the boat, catching fish,” Resweber said. “I think it was the area more than anything. We’d find an area and just go back and forth.”

It was their way of enjoying bass catchin’ fun.