CLARENDON COUNTY, S.C. — Since joining the Progressive Bassmaster Elite Series, Chris Johnston has had one specific goal in mind: winning a tournament built around southern largemouth. The Canadian from Peterborough, Ontario, finally made that happen this week, putting together a dominant performance at the Yokohama Tire Bassmaster Elite at Santee Cooper Lakes. His four-day total of 113 pounds, 12 ounces gave him a nearly 20-pound cushion over runner-up Brandon Palaniuk, securing his second career blue trophy and a $100,000 first-place prize.
“I’ve been pegged as a smallmouth guy up north, but I have been very consistent with these southern fisheries and had some close calls with Bassmaster,” Johnston said. “So, to win one in this fashion is unbelievable. To have the week I had, catching 5-,6- and 7-pounders the whole time, you couldn’t ask for anything more. I don’t think I’ve ever been that dialed in a tournament ever.”
A Century Belt for Both Coasts
This victory marks Johnston’s second Elite Series win, following his 2020 triumph on the St. Lawrence River. He also picked up his second Century Belt along the way, becoming only the third angler in history to earn the prestigious belt on both a smallmouth fishery (St. Lawrence in 2023) and a largemouth fishery. Santee Cooper has now produced nine Century Belts since the Elite Series launched in 2006, and Johnston’s winning weight ranks as the second-highest ever recorded here, trailing only Preston Clark’s 115-15 back in that inaugural season.
Targeting Overlooked Docks
The 10-year veteran built his entire game plan around main lake docks sitting in less than 10 feet of water. He believed these structures held resident largemouth that most competitors simply ignored, thanks to the thick vegetation and cypress trees surrounding them. That made the docks ideal hiding spots for quality fish.
“I don’t think they get a lot of pressure, and I don’t think there are a lot of bass that live on them,” the two-time reigning Angler of the Year said. “There aren’t really any spawning pockets nearby. But the ones that do live there are big ones.”
To reach those fish, Johnston skipped and pitched a Hideup Coike Fullcast deep under the docks – a bait he believes very few Santee Cooper bass have ever seen. He rigged it with a Gamakatsu treble hook and pushed a 1/8-ounce tungsten sinker into the bottom of the bait to make the buoyant material sink properly.
LiveScope Knowledge Applied Without the Screen
Even though this event prohibited forward-facing sonar, Johnston leaned heavily on the techniques he’s developed using his Garmin LiveScope. He would count down his bait to a specific depth before starting his retrieve, keeping it above the bass rather than dropping directly on their heads.
“As soon as I felt it was in the depth range I wanted, I would jerk it. I learned from watching on LiveScope that usually would get the fish’s attention. Then if you give it a double twitch, that gets the bass aggravated. It was almost like working a jerkbait.”
For this tight-quarters style of fishing, Johnston relied on a 7-foot-3 medium-heavy Daiwa Tatula Multi-Purpose casting rod paired with an 8:1:1 Daiwa Tatula SV baitcaster. He tied his Coike to 22-pound Seaguar Tatsu fluorocarbon. “I could have just put one rod on my deck,” he remarked.
Finding the Sweet Spot on Lake Marion
Johnston first discovered his pattern on Lake Moultrie during the opening day of practice, where he got a 4-pound bite and shook off two other quality fish. But when competition began, Moultrie wasn’t cooperating. He moved over to Lake Marion and managed to scrape together a 21-3 limit on Day 1. That move proved decisive. The upper lake became his home for the rest of the tournament. He exploded for 32-8 on Day 2 – which earned him the Rapala CrushCity Monster Bag of the Tournament – then followed up with 29-2 and 30-15 over the final two days.
Championship Sunday started with a 6-pounder that helped him fill out a solid limit. Then he made a long run up Lake Marion to a new area he hadn’t touched yet. He tossed his Coike under a dock and hooked into a 7-7, which took the title of Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Day. Once that fish was in the boat, he felt confident no one in the Top 10 would catch him.
“I set the hook and it didn’t move,” Johnston explained. “It started going sideways and it must have gone around four different poles. My line was one way and it jumped 4 feet to the right of that. Somehow, it swam back through all the poles and to the boat. My small one was 3 pounds at that point.”
After that, the rest of the day was pure bonus. He caught two more bass around 5 pounds and another 6-pounder, which allowed him to cull one of those 5-pounders. “I had one of the best afternoons of the week as far as catching fish goes,” he said. “I wish I had two more hours.”
Palaniuk’s Strong Runner-Up Showing
Brandon Palaniuk spent his entire week in Jack’s Creek on the north side of Lake Marion. He put together limits of 29-1, 29-15, 20-11 and 14-5, marking his fourth Top 5 finish at Santee Cooper and his best result here since winning the event in the fall of 2020.
“It was an incredible week,” Palaniuk said. “The first two days were some of the best days I’ve had on this place. Really, they were some of the most fun days I’ve had fishing. Today, I would have had to have had 34 pounds to win. I’m glad (Chris) caught them that well, it eases the pain.”
Palaniuk has taken a different approach to Santee Cooper every year. This time, he targeted shallow cypress trees that were holding postspawn largemouth. The right combination of a specific contour break and a mix of vegetation – dollar pads, star grass, and other submerged plants – helped him identify the most productive trees. A Hideup Coike Fullcast produced most of his bites over the first two days, but after a 6-pounder destroyed his last Coike, he switched to a homemade urchin-style bait that kept producing.
Cook Completes the Podium
Georgia pro Drew Cook finished third with limits of 21-8, 24-14, 25-11 and 20-8, giving him a three-day total of 92-9. The 2022 Santee Cooper champion once again relied on sight-fishing for spawning largemouth on Lake Marion, though finding active beds proved much more difficult this time around. Most of his success came from clearer water areas with pockets of vegetation, along with a few quality bites from cypress trees and docks.
“It was strictly bed fishing and we milked it for all it was worth,” Cook said. “There would be a pocket in a creek that really wouldn’t look that good and they were all in there. You’d go to the next pocket, and there would be nothing in there. I just had to hunt and peck around.”
Final Results – Top 10 Pros
1st: Chris Johnston, Peterborough, Ontario, 20 bass, 113-12, $103,000
2nd: Brandon Palaniuk, Rathdrum, Idaho, 20 bass, 94-00, $21,000
3rd: Drew Cook, Cairo, Ga., 20 bass, 92-09, $15,000
4th: Cory Johnston, Otonabee, Canada, 20 bass, 92-03, $13,500
5th: Pat Schlapper, Eleva, Wis., 20 bass, 90-03, $11,750
6th: Justin Hamner, Northport, Ala., 20 bass, 85-10, $11,000
7th: Kyle Welcher, Valley, Ala., 20 bass, 83-09, $10,500
8th: Tucker Smith, Birmingham, Ala., 20 bass, 82-08, $10,300
9th: Bob Downey, Detroit Lakes, Minn., 20 bass, 77-05, $10,200
10th: Greg Hackney, Gonzales, La., 19 bass, 71-02, $10,000
Awards and Honors
• Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Tournament: Kyle Norsetter – 9-14 – $3,000
• Rapala CrushCity Monster Bag: Chris Johnston – 32-8 – $2,000
• BassTrakk Contingency: John Crews Jr. – $1,000
• Toyota Bonus Bucks: Drew Cook – $4,000; Kyle Welcher – $3,000
• Yamaha Power Pay: Brandon Palaniuk – $2,500; Drew Cook – $1,500
AOY Standings (Top 10)
1st: Cory Johnston – 483 points
2nd: Trey McKinney – 463
3rd: Dakota Ebare – 455
4th: Cole Sands – 454
5th: Brandon Cobb – 446
6th: John Garrett – 443
7th: Drew Cook – 440
8th: Caleb Hudson – 430
9th: Bob Downey – 426
10th: Justin Atkins – 411
Rookie of the Year leader: Caleb Hudson
The tournament was hosted by the Clarendon County Chamber of Commerce.
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B.A.S.S., which encompasses the Bassmaster tournament leagues, events and media platforms, is the worldwide authority on bass fishing and keeper of the culture of the sport, providing cutting-edge content on bass fishing whenever, wherever and however bass fishing fans want to use it. Headquartered in Birmingham, Ala., the organization’s fully integrated media platforms include the industry’s leading magazines (Bassmaster and B.A.S.S. Times), website (Bassmaster.com), TV show, radio show, social media programs and events. For more than 50 years, B.A.S.S. has been dedicated to access, conservation and youth fishing.
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