Sumrall fishes way into Championship Sunday at Bassmaster Classic

GREENVILLE, South Carolina — The third time IS the charm for Caleb Sumrall of New Iberia, who fished his way Saturday into today’s third and final day of the 2022 Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic.

Championship Sunday awaits Sumrall in his third-ever Bassmaster Classic, which is being held at nearby Lake Hartwell. Proudly, he pulled a weigh-in bag with five bass weighing 16 pounds, 5 ounces, out of his livewell Saturday evening inside the packed Bon Secours Center.

With just a few of the 55 Classic qualifiers remaining to weigh bass on the big stage where big dreams are realized, Sumrall moved into ninth place with a two-day total of 31 pounds, as announced by emcee Dave Mercer, and was in 13th after the last bass hit the scale Saturday.

Sumrall had one of the biggest cheering sections inside Bon Secours Center. He saluted them and said, “I have friends up there, my family, my parrain. They’d all do anything for me. I love y’all to death.”

He is 5 pounds, 7 ounces, behind tournament co-leaders Jason Christie of Park Hill, Oklahoma, and Kyle Welcher of Opelika, Alabama, who both have 36 pounds, 7 ounces. Christie pushed his two-day total to 36-7 by adding 19-6 Saturday to the 17-1 he caught Friday. Welcher, meanwhile, reached the mark by adding 17-10 to his Day 1 catch of 18-13.

Using Garmin LiveScope for fishing away from the shoreline, plus his experience of shallow-water tactics, Christie used two undisclosed lures to catch bass in depths ranging from 6 inches to 30- feet. Unlike other competitors this week, he has been unable to dial in a pattern around boat docks.

‘I don’t know if there are just not that many fish there or if I’m just not around them or what, but I just still haven’t gotten into the groove on the dock deal. I keep trying. Today, I even fished new water … and didn’t catch anything. Tomorrow (today), I’ll just go run the stuff that’s been working and we’ll see,” Christie said.

Sumrall leaves Greenwell Pond Landing this morning at 6 a.m. in his Xpress bass boat with other Elites who made the Top 25 cut Saturday. He’s enjoying his return to where his pro bass days began.

He won the B.A.S.S. Nation Championship at Lake Hartwell in October 2017. That overwhelming victory jump-started his career on the Bassmaster Elite Series.

Will lightning strike twice in the same place? He’s going to try to make it happen today and get his hands on pro bass fishing’s Holy Grail.

“Man, it’s kind of a shootout,” Sumrall told Mercer, noting he believed there were many 6-pound class bass throughout the lake and, hey, there’s a chance he can get his hands on more than one of them today.

Sumrall and the other 24 Elites are casting today for a $300,000 first-place prize that comes with the most coveted trophy in competitive bass fishing. The 34-year-old outdoorsman who fishes and hunts with a passion made returning to the Bassmaster Classic his main priority in 2021.

The New Iberian did just that with a phenomenal effort in the regular-season tournaments last year. He finished seventh in the Angler of the Year standings with 659 points, easily qualifying for this year’s world championship of bass fishing at Lake Hartwell.

Sumrall has reached Championship Sunday three times in his five-year Elite career but never, ever in the Bassmaster Classic. Until this weekend.

He was just inside the cut line in 25th after weighing in five bass for 14 pounds, 11 ounces, Friday and the needle could have gone either way Saturday on his fate for Championship Sunday. His second day fish-catching effort moved it dramatically in the right direction.

Just like Friday, Sumrall had his limit early Saturday, none heavier than an estimated 2 pounds. He began upgrading, by the hardest for the next few hours, then put four 3-pound class in the livewell before 2 p.m.

Two other Louisiana bass pros advanced to Championship Sunday. Greg Hackney of Gonzales was 19th with 30 pounds, 1 ounces, while Nick LeBrun of Bossier City claimed the 25th spot with 29 pounds, 7 ounces.

Welcher, 29, who’s tied for first with Christie, cut his teeth on Chattahoochee River fisheries like West Point Lake, Lake Harding and Lake Eufala. Hartwell, he said, reminds him of West Point with clear water, clay and sand, same types of rocks and same depths close to the shoreline.

“I’m doing the exactly the same stuff here that I would be doing on West Point – it’s almost identical. Since I fish those kinds of areas a lot, I just kind of know where the largemouth get. There’s way more spotted bass in this late than largemouth, and if you can find those places where the largemouth continuously get, your weight is usually going to be a little higher,” Welcher said, noting he hopes to weigh in five largemouths today.

Fans can tune in to today’s action as it unfolds on the water for Championship Sunday on FS1 from 7 a.m.-11 a.m., and more live coverage after that on BassmasterLIVE at bassmaster.com.