By MLF Communications Staff
FRANKLIN COUNTY, Va. – After racking up more than 75 pounds on Day 1, Michael Neal didn’t need to catch another bass during Group A’s second day of qualifying to maintain his spot atop ScoreTracker at Heavy Hitters. The Tennessee pro went ahead and added seven scorable bass for 22 pounds, 5 ounces anyway, bringing his two-day total to 98-3 to win the group’s Qualifying Round by nearly 25 pounds.
While Neal’s lead afforded him a stress-free day exploring new water on Smith Mountain Lake, plenty of drama unfolded further down the standings. Jeff Sprague and Nick Hatfield both put together huge days to rally from below the elimination line and qualify for the Knockout Round. Hatfield’s 17 scorable bass included a 5-6 largemouth that earned him $10,000 as the biggest bass of the day.
Meanwhile, the elimination line jumped all the way from 24-9 at the start of the day to 53-11 at lines out. With less than 20 minutes left, Cliff Crochet boated a 3-8 to leap past Bass Pro Tour stars Jacob Wheeler and Alton Jones Jr. and claim the final Knockout Round berth. He and the rest of the Top 8 finishers from the group will return to the water Wednesday, when the big bass of the day will be worth $30,000 and the Top 10 finishers will earn a trip to the Championship Round.
Neal spent the day trying to expand and refine the bite that produced his big Day 1. He started out fishing new banks in the same general area of the riverine upper end of the lake, trying to ascertain exactly how much room he’ll have to work with during the Knockout Round.
While he didn’t find much new productive water – he didn’t catch his first scorable bass until the final minutes of Period 1 – he was at least able to eliminate certain sections based on water temperature.
“I went out with the game plan just to expand basically as far away as I could and still do the same exact thing in the same general area,” he explained. “The water temperature was way different, way colder. No signs of a bait spawn or anything like that. … Just kept working my way closer to where I was and got about to where I really anticipated that it would start picking up again. The water temperature warmed up and started getting bit again.”
From there, Neal focused on dialing in his bait choice. Whereas he caught almost all of his Day 1 weight on a spinnerbait, all but one of his scorable bass Monday ate topwater lures, primarily a frog and a buzzbait. He found that the amount of shade dictated the best presentation.
“I feel like the amount of shade that’s on the bank determines what bait you need to be throwing,” Neal said. “When you get in a bunch of shade, you need to be winding something, and when you get in them little pockets, that’s when a frog or a little popper – something that stays in place more – is coming into play. And that helps me going into this next round to know when I can cover more water and when I can’t.”
Armed with that knowledge, Neal said he is “100-percent committed” to fishing the rest of the event in the zone that’s produced for him so far. While fishing pressure is a concern, he’s optimistic that the bass shouldn’t be leaving the area anytime soon – if anything, more should be coming to him.
“They're on the main drag, on the steepest banks on the main drag, so really the only choice that they’ve got is to go suspend,” he said. “Otherwise, they have nowhere else to go as far as more toward a summer pattern.
“I know the fish are there, even for more than one boat, for somebody to win.”
Here are the totals for the competitors who'll move on to the Knockout Round:
1st: Michael Neal, Dayton, Tenn., 33 bass, 98-3
2nd: Jeff Sprague, Wills Point, Texas, 25 bass, 73-9
3rd: Nick Hatfield, Greeneville, Tenn., 22 bass, 70-15
4th: Fred Roumbanis, Russellville, Ark., 19 bass, 66-11
5th: Edwin Evers, Talala, Okla., 24 bass, 63-12
6th: Drew Gill, Mount Carmel, Ill., 23 bass, 61-12
7th: Mark Daniels Jr., Tuskegee, Ala., 23 bass, 58-15
8th: Cliff Crochet, Pierre Part, La., 18 bass, 53-11
Finishing the event in 9th through 15th place were:
9th: Alton Jones Jr., Waco, Texas, 19 bass, 52-15
10th: Jacob Wheeler, Harrison, Tenn., 19 bass, 51-11
11th: Dave Lefebre, Erie, Pa., 14 bass, 42-14
12th: Matt Becker, Ten Mile, Tenn., 13 bass, 39-13
13th: Dylan Hays, Hot Springs, Ark., six bass, 19-4
14th: Alton Jones, Lorena, Texas, seven bass, 18-15
15th: Andy Morgan, Dayton, Tenn., seven bass, 18-11
A bass must meet the 2-pound minimum weight requirement to be deemed scorable in the Qualifying and Knockout Rounds, but for the final-day Championship Round a bass must weigh at least 3 pounds to be deemed scorable.
After each two-day qualifying round is complete, the Top 8 anglers from each group advance to Wednesday’s Knockout Round. Weights will zeroed, and the remaining 16 anglers compete to finish in the Top 10 to advance to the Championship Round.
Weights are zeroed again for the Championship Round and the highest one-day total wins the top prize of $100,000.
In addition to overall tournament awards, Berkley Big Bass bonuses are awarded in each round of competition with payouts of $10,000 for the single biggest bass on each day of Group A and B Qualifying, $30,000 for the biggest bass in the Knockout Round and $100,000 for the biggest bass in the Championship Round.
The Bass Pro Tour trailering policy has been enacted for this event, so anglers will depart Trinity Ecumenical Parish each morning at 6:15 a.m. to one of five launch ramps located around the fishery. Anglers will return to Trinity Ecumenical Parish each evening following the end of competition at 3:45 p.m.
To qualify for Heavy Hitters, the weight of an angler’s single-largest bass from each of the seven 2024 Bass Pro Tour events was recorded. The 30 anglers with the heaviest total from those seven bass qualified to compete in this event.
The MLFNOW! broadcast team of Chad McKee and J.T. Kenney break down the extended action live on each day of competition from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET. MLFNOW! is livestreamed on MajorLeagueFishing.com, the MyOutdoorTV (MOTV) app, and Rumble.
