GREENFIELD, Mo. (May 6, 2019) – Boater Marty Matherly of Joplin, Missouri, won the Bass Fishing League (BFL) Ozark Division tournament on Stockton Lake Saturday with five bass weighing 14 pounds, 3 ounces. Matherly pocketed $5,279 for his day on the water.
“The night before the tournament, my buddy told me to fish the moment, so I did,” said Matherly, who earned his first win FLW competition. “I told my co-angler I was going to throw a topwater because of the cloud cover and how calm it was, but in Son’s Creek my co-angler immediately caught a 3-pounder flipping. I decided to go with what they were biting. I started flipping bushes and immediately caught fish. They were on the outside edge of the bushes.
“By 9 [a.m.], I think I had three largemouth,” continued Matherly. “I had a feeling that fish were both coming from the spawn and going to spawn, so I moved out 20 yards past the main-lake point outside Son’s Creek, and that’s where I caught a 5-pounder in some bushes.”
Matherly said he used a Texas-rigged, Sooner Run-colored Gene Larew Hoodaddy with a 3/8th-ounce WOO! tungsten weight to catch his initial fish. After hooking one and losing it nearby, he said he went two hours without a bite. After some more time spent in Son’s Creek, he headed back toward the dam to finish out his limit.
“My fifth fish came from 20 feet of clear water at the dam, on a flat with rocks,” said Matherly. “I caught a few small ones at other spots before going to a main-lake point, also by the dam. With about 30 minutes left to fish, I caught a 3-pound largemouth. It was my winning fish.”
Matherly’s final two fish were caught on a ¾-ounce PBJ-colored Omega football-head jig with a green-pumpkin Strike King Rage Tail Space Monkey.
The top 10 boaters finished the tournament in:
1st: Marty Matherly, Joplin, Mo., five bass, 14-3, $5,279
2nd: Brock Reinkemeyer, Lone Jack, Mo., five bass, 13-10, $2,140
3rd: Bob Renken, Linn Creek, Mo., five bass, 13-0, $1,426
4th: Quenten Reed, Osage Beach, Mo., five bass, 12-10, $1,603
5th: Jeremy Montgomery, Overland Park, Kan., five bass, 12-8, $1,106
6th: Eric Poindexter, Eufaula, Okla., four bass, 11-11, $1,085
7th: Marcus Sykora, Osage Beach, Mo., five bass, 11-2, $877
7th: Chad G. Allison, Carl Junction, Mo., five bass, 11-2, $877
9th: Greg Berhorst, Holts Summit, Mo., five bass, 11-0, $671
10th: Cory Steckler, Rocky Mount, Mo., five bass, 10-14, $474
10th: Glenn Harrison, Arma, Kan., five bass, 10-14, $474
Reed caught a 5-pound, 14-ounce bass – the heaviest of the event in the Boater Division – and earned the day’s Boater Big Bass award of $605. Michael Fey Sr. of Cuba, Missouri, won the Co-angler Division and $2,291 Saturday after catching five bass weighing 12 pounds, 9 ounces.
The top 10 co-anglers were:
1st: Michael Fey Sr., Cuba, Mo., five bass, 12-9, $2,291
2nd: Daniel Ashby, Independence, Mo., five bass, 12-3, $1,070
3rd: Jeff Moss, Oronogo, Mo., five bass, 11-13, $863
4th: Joshua Dyrland, Imperial, Mo., five bass, 9-14, $699
5th: Christopher Cross, Kansas City, Kan., five bass, 9-1, $428
6th: Dennis Whitaker, Smithville, Mo., four bass, 8-14, $392
7th: Ben Freeman, Oronogo, Mo., four bass, 8-6, $357
8th: Anthony Johnson, Excelsior Springs, Mo., five bass, 8-5, $321
9th: Andrew Messina, Valley Park, Mo., five bass, 8-0, $285
10th: Mark Hancock, Olathe, Kan., three bass, 7-10, $250
Moss caught the heaviest bass in the Co-angler Division, a fish weighing in at 5 pounds, 1 ounce. The catch earned him the day’s Co-angler Big Bass award of $151.