We’re into the last 2 hours now, the last hour of fishing really for several anglers, factoring in the run back. Let’s take a look near the top of the leaderboard to see who has the best chance to improve upon his day and make a run at the lead.
Joey Cifuentes III sits atop BassTrakk, with right at 20 pounds on the day and nothing in his bag under 3 and 3/4 pounds. It’ll take 4-pounder now for the Arkansas angler to add cushion to his 1 pound, 2 ounce lead on Taku Ito, a lead that looks far better than it is.
Yes, Day 2 leader Taku Ito sits 1-2 back of Cifuentes, but he also has 18-3 on the day, with a 4-0 and 5-0 in his bag. Three light 3-pounders means one or two big bites for Taku could not only move him to the lead, but even put him a pound or more ahead. Ito weighed five over 5 on average yesterday.
Kyoya Fujita has moved to a virtual tie with Ito, riding a near-21-pound bag up a few places from where he started in 6th this morning. Fujita has one thing working against him though, he has quintuplets in his bag, all five fish weighing 4 pounds. It’ll take a real big one for Fujita to advance.
Brandon Lester sits in 5th. Within a pound an a half of the lead and with a light 3-pounder as his smallest, Lester is a 4-and-1/2-pound bite from making things interesting.
Cooper Gallant sits in 5th, 2 pounds back with three he’s estimating to be under 4 pounds.
Luke Palmer, Ed Loughran III, Bryan Schmitt and Jacob Foutz are all scary too, each with multiple 4s, all but Palmer having a 5-pounder. Foutz, Schmitt and Loughran will all need another giant to claw their way towards the lead. Palmer in better shape having started the day in 3rd.
