Quincy Houchin of Mabelvale, Ark. weighed a five-bass limit totaling 11-07 Saturday to claim a wire-to-wire victory at the FLW Series Central Division opener on Lake Dardanelle. Houchin’s 3-day total of 15 bass weighing 45-04 was enough to earn him the win by an 11-ounce margin and a check for $50,200.
“I was really nervous today when I was only bringing 11 pounds to the scale, but I knew that it was pretty tough out there for everybody,” said Houchin, a 10-year BFL veteran who was fishing in his first career FLW Series event. “Mid-day I lost a 5-pounder right at the boat and I thought that I had just lost $50,000. To get the win today, in my first Costa event – I am blessed.”
Houchin said that he caught his fish this week from a backwater area in the mid- to upper-end of the lake. He said it was a 3/4-mile stretch full of wood and timber that was 4 to 8 feet at its deepest point, but he fished it as shallow as 2 feet.
“I was catching eight to 10 keepers a day out of there,” he said. “There wasn’t a lot of fish, but the ones that I was catching there were quality.”
Houchin said that of the 15 bass that he weighed in throughout the week, one came on a natural-green-colored Spro Bronzeye frog, two came on a black moss-colored Lucky Craft 2.5 crankbait and the rest came flipping a Texas-rigged green-pumpkin and red Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver.
“The key for me was finding that backwater where no one else was fishing,” he said. “There is a huge sandbar you have to cross to get back there, and most of the time you can’t. But I checked it in practice and the water was ankle-deep, so I was able to work my way back in there. I don’t know if anyone else had tried, but I was the only boat in there all week.”
Full details of his winning pattern will be published soon.
Here are the final totals for the top 10:
1. Quincy Houchin: 45-04
2. Tom Silber: 44-09
3. Joey Cifuentes: 43-13
4. Josh Ray: 43-08
5. Zach King: 42-01
6. Evan Barnes: 40-08
7. Garrett Paquette: 39-01
8. Shannon Pierce: 38-15
9. Cole Floyd: 38-15
10. Brandon Lee: 31-04
