ALEXANDER CITY, Ala. — Will Davis knows his 13-pound catch might be difficult to replicate on Day 2 of the St. Croix Bassmaster Open at Lake Martin presented by SEVIIN. Even so, the tournament leader after Day 1 has the advantage of local knowledge to repeat the feat.
Davis’ total equals the average winning weight of one-day tournaments held in recent weeks on the central Alabama fishery. The native Alabamian from nearby Childersberg also knows winning requires a multi-pattern game plan.
Lake Martin is overpopulated with spotted bass, crowding out the lesser largemouth population by a long shot. On the upside, those fish are heavier by average weight so they can’t be ignored as an opportunity.
Davis’ bag was anchored by such a catch, the 4 pound, 9-ounce largemouth that earned him Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Day. That effort aligned with one of the riskier of two strategies in play at this tournament.
Going through numbers of spotted bass to gain ounces (not pounds) is the time-consuming strategy. You get the limit but it averages the same weight as most of the field. The Day 1 leaderboard proves the point. The Top 3 anglers had over 12 pounds with the double-digit weights ending in 20th place at 10 pounds.
The other option is deliberately targeting the biggest fish in the lake. The bites are fewer but the risk is worth the reward. Davis only had eight bites all day and he made those count.
While Davis isn’t fishing for Tackle Warehouse Bassmaster Elite Qualifier points (he’s already a Bassmaster Elite Series pro), Dakota Ebare is in the hunt for that status.
The veteran pro from Texas was third overall on Day 2 with 12-7 and sixth in EQ points, powered by a quality bite that appeared during the morning session. The pattern shows promise, given that Ebare caught a limit within the first 30 minutes with a 3-9 largemouth kicker caught in the afternoon anchoring his catch. Like Davis, he is targeting bigger bass on fewer bites.
Wisely, Ebare went searching for new water to expand on his success.
“I’m looking for bigger bites so just randomly looking for number fish isn’t an option,” he said. “When you do that, it takes slowing down unlike when you play the numbers game. Because there are fewer bites you must keep looking for new water.”
Cody Meyer, fourth after Day 1 and unofficially leading the Opens EQ points race as of midmorning, relied on a dock and shoreline strategy to fill his limit weighing 11-13.
The Idaho angler used a Yamamoto Baits Ika and Senko, using the baits to first fill a limit and then fish shallow water to cull up on a quality bite.
There was little movement in the top tier of the points standings, aligning with the ounces-tight scores on the leaderboard. Officially, Easton Fothergill remained the 1597 points. Matt Adams is nineth with 1454 points, while Beau Browning is first man outside the cut with 1443 points. The Top 9 anglers earn invitations to the 2025 Bassmaster Elite Series when the tournament concludes on Saturday.
