MYETTE POINT – Yes, Virginia, the 2022 Angler(s) of the Year on the Wednesday Night Hawg Fights Bass Tournament are fishing the evening circuit in 2023.

Through the first five tournaments, however, it wasn’t noticeable as Mike Sinitiere and Mike O’Brien barely sniffed a top three finish in the four tournaments at Lake Fausse Pointe out of Marsh Field Boat Landing and one at Bayou Benoit Boat Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin.

The season’s sixth tournament was the charm for the New Iberians, who were feeling froggy following the long overdue win May 31. Sinitiere and O’Brien finished first in a 22-boat field that fished the Atchafalaya Basin out of Myette Point Boat Landing.

“Yeah, it feels good. Like I told Austin and Gavin (fellow Hawg Fighters Austin Theriot and Gavin Savoy), it’s about time to get in there with a first. Hopefully, it’s the beginning of a good run. Hopefully, we’re keep it going and win Angler(s) of the Year again,” O’Brien said.

Sinitiere said, “It was good to get back in the win column, back on track. Now that the Basin’s falling, I guess it’s tunnel hull time.”

It was a close race for the top spot. Bo Amy, fishing alone, was second with a limit tipping the digital scare to 6.44 pounds for $297 while Theriot and Savoy kept their stranglehold on first place in the AOY race with three bass weighing 6.08 pounds worth $198.

The winners rode a leopard-colored plastic frog to the big payday, a soft plastic bogus hopper that O’Brien had tied on the business end of his fishing line, to boat a three-bass limit weighing 6.70 pounds worth $495.

They took a long boat ride in his Bullet bass boat to the Amerada Hess oilfield off the Atchafalaya River, the same place they traveled to finish fourth May 3 in the tournament out of Bayou Benoit Boat Landing. O’Brien’s prefishing results in the days leading up to the recent tournament were mixed but they chose to go there.

“We had a plan. We stuck to it because we didn’t catch fish anywhere else. It worked out,” Sinitiere said. “It wasn’t fast and furious.”

It took the longest time in a short tournament format to catch seven keepers.

“We had one fish when he had that one (on),” Sinitiere said.

“That one” was a 4-pound class bass that got hooked up on the plastic frog cast by O’Brien. But it got away.

“That sucker blew up, too,” Sinitiere said about the hellacious bite.

O’Brien was unhappy about that one long after the tournament that began at 5:30 p.m. and ended with the weigh-in at 8:20 p.m.

“I hate that I missed that big fish,” he said about the good-sized bass that bit in some thick grass.

The retired outboard motor mechanic tried to horse it in, which was a big mistake, he admitted, because unbeknownst to him there was a heavy deadfall between him and the bass, which won the tug-of-war and became unbuttoned.

“I did the wrong thing. I should have gone to it with the trolling motor. It was a mistake,” he said.

O’Brien shook off the loss and put the keepers that won the tournament in the livewell.

“Ours were fat. They were eating heavy. The livewell was full of crawfish peelings and stuff, legs,” he said.

There was plenty of time between bites from keeper bass but the veteran bass fishing team didn’t mind. They got their limit between 6:45-7 p.m., Sinitiere said, then culled when possible.

“Oh, we weren’t down because we were getting bites. That’s part of fishing,” he said.

“Yeah, it was fun. I honestly didn’t think we’d win it,” O’Brien said.

They did and the slump was over.

WN Hawg Fights BTS #7 is scheduled to be held July 14 at Bayou Benoit Boat Landing in the Atchafalaya Basin.