Florida's Terry Scroggins, a Triton/Merc guy, is in only his third year as a Bassmaster Tour pro, but now he finds himself atop the Bassmaster Tour points - and just cracked the Top 10 in the world in the State Farm-BassFan World Rankings. How does he feel?

"I've never been here before, but I like it," he said.



"That's where you want to be. My goal (this season) was to just try to make the Classic, and everything's falling into place."

How? What's different? "I changed my practice a little bit," he said. "In previous years, when I'd go to new lakes I'd make a big mistake. I'd try to look at the whole lake. Now I'm just picking sections of the lake and working them over pretty thoroughly."

He changed to that practice style because "the other stuff wasn't working. I fish really fast and try to cover a whole lot of water, but I was making a mistake before. I was trying to cover too much water. I found some things before, but I fished too fast and also missed some things. Now I try to do more work in smaller areas."

Not Just Florida Anymore

In his first two seasons he did well in Florida - the toughest state for many pros - but then not so well outside of his home state. "Everybody knows that Florida fishes differently than anywhere else in the country," he said. "From growing up fishing there, that's all I knew.

"Now I'm learning how to fish these other lakes around the country - not as fast as I'd like to, but it's coming around."

Anything Else?

Asked if there's anything else going on, Scroggins said: "I'm just on a good roll. Everyone is asking me if I'm getting pumped up about this or that, but I'm acting the same way.

"In my rookie season (2003), after four events I was 2nd in the points and then fell out of it. That was the year we had 10 tournaments, and after 10 events I was 44th. So I know what can happen. I'm just taking these things one at a time. Just go fishing and have fun with it."

No Pressure?

He's confident going into the last two events of the Bassmaster Tour season. He's never fished a tournament on Norman, but he did ride around on it before the cutoff and liked what he saw. "I like it better than Clarks Hill (where he finished 19th)," he said.

He also likes Table Rock. He finished 80th there last year, but said: "I had 35 bites the last day of practice, but then a big storm blew in and messed it up. But I like it a lot."

Right now, he said he feels no pressure. "I'm just going fishing. If I'm still leading going into the last event there might be pressure, but right now I'm just having a good time fishing. I have a lot of respect for anyone on tour, but you have to fish against the fish. You can't worry about the other guys."

Notable

> Scroggins is rooming with veteran Kentucky angler Kevin Wirth, who also had a Top 10 debut last week in the State Farm World Rankings, and is 9th in the Bassmaster points. "What we're doing is working pretty good," Scroggins said. "We help each other out. If he's on a pattern that's working, he tells me. And if I'm on one that's working, I tell him about it."