Two long-time fishing buddies once made a storied, extra-long boat ride that paid off handsomely with a Hawg Fight Classic win in 2018.

Mike Sinitiere of New Iberia and Brooke Morrison of Lafayette recently logged another prolonged boat ride, this time on Sept. 8 in Morrison’s new Triton TXR 19 powered by a 225-h.p. Mercury. It was a rewarding trip, too, on Day 2 of a two-day tournament hosted by the Louisiana Bass Cats.

A day earlier, Sinitiere and Morrison fished Day 1 out of Myette Point Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin. Their five-bass limit that rainy day weighed 12.20 pounds, less than 1 pound out of the lead forged by new bass club members Mitch Suire and Jared Trahan, who opened with 13.10 pounds.

Sinitiere and Morrison rode back to their fishin’ hole in the Atchafalaya Basin on the second day of the bass club’s seventh tournament of 2024. Their starting point Sunday was Marsh Field Landing at Lake Fausse Pointe, where the 13-boat field left Teche Lake Canal at safe daylight, and arrived 1 hour and 20 minutes later at their destination north of Mud Cove.

Sinitiere and Morrison, who teamed up to win Hawg Fight AOY in 2017 and won the Hawg Fight Classic the following year on a 1-plus hour boat ride to the Bayou Black area from Myette Point Landing, weeded out keeper bass after keeper bass to weigh a limit at 13.16 pounds for a winning two-day total of 25.36 pounds worth $540.

Morrison, 53-year-old owner of Billeaud’s II in New Iberia, said he had no qualms about going for it with another prolonged run that Sunday.

“I mean, after we caught as many fish as we did Saturday, to me it was a no-brainer. It was definitely worth the run. And we caught our 13 pounds of fish. Caught a lot of fish on top of it,” he said.

Sinitiere, 63, a development manager for Coca-Cola United, said the team caught about 50 keepers Saturday with the Atchafalaya River hovering around or just under 4.0 feet at Butte La Rose. They had company in their huge honey hole the first day but didn’t expect as many other boats Day 2 because of the distance from Lake Fausse Pointe.

“We figured we had a chance because we figured not everybody would be able to run back. So we took our chances and it worked out,” Sinitiere said. Later, reports indicated at least five other boats made the long haul the second day.

Bass bit on soft plastic creature baits and spinnerbaits the first day, then mostly on spinnerbaits and crank baits on Day 2.

“It took about an hour to figure them out” and get a limit Day 1, Sinitiere said, but only 20 minutes to get five bass in the livewell the second day. The winners culled with three 3-pound class bass between noon and 1 p.m., he said, before leaving at 1:20 p.m. to race to the other side of the West Atchafalaya Basin Levee all the way to Marshfield Landing.

On the return they stopped around Baldwin to help another tournament boat that ran out of gas and took one of the two anglers and limit back with them.

“We made it with 17 minutes to go,” Sinitiere said.

Fuel was a slight concern. Morrison’s Triton holds 45 gallons. When he and his tournament partner got back, there was one left in the gas tank.

“I just got my boat. We just went for it. I just felt like we could make it. I kind of babied it on the way there,” Morrison said. However, he added quickly, he pretty much floored it on the way back.

About the slight change in patterns each day, he said, “I really think there were a couple groups of fish you could fish for. Boat traffic was a big issue. Sunday morning we decided to go to one of the spots (with boat traffic) to get a limit.”

The W catapulted Sinitiere, the bass club’s defending champion, into first place in the race for Angler of the Year.

One of the other big stories from the bass club’s tournament was the second-place finish by New Iberian Kevin Suit and Moon Griffon of Lafayette. After weighing in 12.91 pounds Saturday, they stayed in the swollen lake the next day and hammered out another limit weighing 10.52 pounds for a two-day total of 23.43 pounds for $324.

Suit said the key on Day 2, a sunny, post-cold front day, was making adjustments as the pattern changed.

“We went from hopping from cypress tree to cypress tree early on worms to crank baits on laydowns and then drains,” Suit said.

Local bass anglers Rusty Owens and Brandon Sellers finished third with limits both days weighing 11.07 pounds on Day 1, following up with five bass going 10.02 pounds for a total of 21.09 pounds worth $216.