Grove, OK – Welcome fisherman to the first installment of the 2015 XFL-Extreme Fishing League presented by Skeeter Boats. It was deja vu all over again. The 2014 and 2015 openers saw very similar water conditions: COLD and clear. Mother Nature teased us with a major warming trend in early February. The fish were biting and this first tournament was shaping up to be a slug fest.
However, Mother Nature’s cantankerous old man, Old Man Winter, had other ideas. This old s.o.b. decided to blast the region with several back-to-back arctic cold fronts that brought in frigid temperatures, snow and ice. If the fish had any ideas of moving shallow, they scrapped those plans for the relative ease of gorging on dying shad. Water temps plummeted for two straight weeks and by Friday water temps were reported in the high 30’s with some coves still being ice-covered. But temps warmed to the mid 40’s by Saturday afternoon and some anglers reported catching a few fish. Sunday morning dawned overcast with tolerable air temperature with the high for the day in the mid-50’s. 189 teams showed up for this event; and as expected, found the bite very tough. This was evidenced by only 73 teams bringing a fish to the scales of which 21 were 5 fish limits. Fishing was so tough that it only took 4.71lbs to get in the money. The bright side is the average fish was a very healthy 2.67lbs. First place was the team of Jason Wilson and Orlean Smith with a 5 fish limit going 21.44lbs. Jason and Orlean took home the $20,000 first place prize and the $5,000 Skeeter Owner Bonus prize for being the highest finisher in a qualifying Skeeter boat. Second place went to the team of Marcus Sykora and Cole Adair for a 5 fish limit of 17.86 lbs worth $10,000. Big Bass of the event of 7.17 lbs was brought in by the team of Josh Greer and Art Hines. They took home $1,000 for this fish. At total of $37,800 was collected in entry fees and $56,770 was paid out for a 150% payout. I visited with Orlean and he shared his team’s key to victory.
Jason and Orlean pre-fished on Friday in the Elk River. Not liking what they found and knowing the Elk would be a very popular spot on Sunday, the team decided their chances where just as good down lake. Saturday, the fished from daylight to 5:00 pm concentrating on the area from Shangri-La to the dam. For the day they caught 4 keepers with 2 coming off one spot. Based upon this they decided to start on the spot the 2 keepers came from. Sunday morning they arrived at this spot and fished for over an hour without a bite. Just about the time they were thinking of changing locations, they caught a small, non-keeper. That’s all it took to fire up the school of fish and the team caught 7 or 8 keepers on nearly every cast. The bite then slowed and the team continued to work this area. The area was only about 100 yards long and was nothing more than a nondescript pea gravel flat 10-14′ deep. The key to getting a bite was extreme patience. The were using a Mega Bass shad colored jerkbait on 8 lb test line. They would make a cast, rip it down and let it sit. The longer the bait sat still, the better the chance of getting a bite. The team continued to slowly work the area, built on their limit and caught a total of 14 keepers for the day. A key moment was around 2:15. Orlean was a little tired and decided to sit down on the deck (they didn’t have a chair or butt seat in the boat) and eat a snickers bar. Orlean makes a cast, rips the bait down, unwraps the candy bar and takes a bite. Orlean finishes the first bite, twitches the bait again and takes another bite. Half way through chewing up his second bite, a fish decides to eat his jerkbait. So, there’s Orlean, sitting on the deck with a snickers bar in one hand and his rod in the other with a fish on. Remarkably, Orlean manages to get to his feet and land the fish. It turned out to be a key fish that culled out their smallest one. This just goes to show that when it’s your day, it’s your day. Jason and Orlean wish to thank Lew’s Reels, Skeeter Boats and Nichols Marine-McAlester for their support.
On behalf of the XFL Staff I want to thank all the participants and all the sponsors for their support. We look forward to a great 2015 season and hope to see everyone at the next event on Lake Eufaula on April 19th out of Peters Point in Eufaula Cove. Until then, this is Capt. Rob saying stay safe and good luck fishing. I’ll see you on the water.
Capt. Rob