KISSIMMEE, Fla, July 20, 2021 /Will Doud-Martin for Bass Angler Magazine/—After last year’s canceled ICAST show due to COVID-19, the 2021 show officially kicked off today with the annual ICAST Cup on Lake Tohopekaliga. The four hour mini-tournament saw two bags over 25 pounds brought to the scales, with the Lucky Go Fishing/Fish Bites team of Terrie Huffmaster, Tonya Michelle, and Jackson Williams taking home top honors with a record catch of 25 pounds, 10 ounces.
I personally fished as the media representative with the Hawg Tech team consisting of boat captain and pro staffer Erik Tilson, and Hawg Tech owner, Robert Perez.
Hawg Tech, based in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla, manufactures high-performance bearings, handles, and knobs for baitcasting reels. Furthermore, Hawg Tech engineers tungsten flipping/pitching and worm weights. Their unique design and compact size penetrates cover better and creates a more complete connection to soft plastics, especially worms. The weights have a durable matte finish to reduce or eliminate chipping and a soft nylon insert to protect line from abrasion.
For more information, be sure to check out www.hawgtech.com , and follow along with all of this year’s ICAST news at www.icastfishing.org.
Lucky Go Fishing/Fish Bites Win Seventh-Annual ICAST Cup Presented by Major League Fishing on Lake Toho
A Total of $11,000 Raised for Keep America Fishing™ Foundation
Representing Lucky Go Fishing and Fish Bites, the team of Terrie Huffmaster, Tonya Michelle and Jackson Williams weighed in a five-bass limit totaling 25 pounds, 10 ounces, to win the 2021 ICAST Cup at Lake Toho Presented by Major League Fishing (MLF) Tuesday. The four-hour bass-fishing tournament, hosted by Kissimmee Sports, was the kick-off event to ICAST 2021 and raised a total of $11,000 to benefit the industry’s angler advocacy program, Keep America Fishing™.
The field totaled 55 boats, including about a handful of MLF Bass Pro Tour, Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit and Toyota Series anglers, as well as outdoor media and industry representatives from popular tackle brand and non-profits. In its five-year history, the charity tournament has raised more than $61,000 for Keep America Fishing.
The Lucky Go Fishing/Fish Bites team won by a margin of 10 ounces over Team USA Bassin’, which was comprised of Richard Patterson, Dave Smith and Glen Cabezas. Their limit weighing 25-10 was a new ICAST Cup record for the heaviest limit ever weighed in the event.
“What a day. This has been so awesome. This is a day that I will remember for the rest of my life,” an emotional Huffmaster said on stage. “To everyone that put this event on and made it happen – MLF, ICAST, everybody here – thank you for putting this on and making this happen. I cannot tell you how humbled I am and how blessed I feel right now. I’m way past Cloud 9 – I’m on Cloud 14 or 15 right now.”
The duo estimated they caught around 35 to 40 bass throughout the morning, but said that they caught the majority of their weight in the first 30 minutes. They credited just one bait as being the key.
“We tried a few different baits early, but they weren’t biting. Then we picked up a Zoom Magnum Ultra Vibe Speed Worm (black and blue) and caught five of our big fish within the first 30 minutes,” Michelle said. “We ended up sticking with it for the rest of the day.”
“We also did not have a net in the boat,” Huffmaster added. “When we’d set the hook and see the big ones flopping on the water, it was chaos. We were just telling each other to stay calm, keep it down, and get it to the boat.
“We really had no thoughts at all about winning or losing today coming into this,” Huffmaster went on to say. “We literally just prayed about it this morning and wanted to get out there and have fun.”
Mission accomplished!
The top 10 teams finished the tournament in:
1st: Lucky Go Fishing/Fish Bites – Terrie Huffmaster, Tonya Michelle and Jackson Williams, five bass, 25-10
2nd: USA Bassin’ – Richard Patterson, Dave Smith and Glen Cabezas, five bass, 25-0
3rd: American Baitworks – Robert Greenburg and J.T. Kenney, five bass, 21-5
4th: Chasin’ Fin – Nathan Bloom and Joey Bloom, five bass, 19-14
5th: JL Marine/Power-Pole – Greg Wats, Ray Trudeau and James Everhart, five bass, 18-14
6th: BNB Jigs – Bob Bakewell and Bobby Bakewell, five bass, 17-9
7th: American Tackle Co. – Jeff Mathews, Jimmy Drury and Joe Opager, five bass, 17-1
8th: Green Outdoors – Ronnie Green, Christian Greico and Samantha Gay, five bass, 16-7
9th: Lithium Pros – Steve Bishop, Ken Lucas and Charity Muehlenweg, five bass, 15-4
10th: Lew’s – John Carman, Peter Thliveros and Matthew Mattingly, five bass, 15-0
Complete results and photos from the tournament will be posted at ICASTCup.com.
USA Bass partnered with MLF and Keep America Fishing to award the top-finishing women’s pair at the ICAST Cup a spot on the 2022 USA Pan American Bass fishing team. The highest-finishing team of female anglers was Michelle Jalaba and Melissa Young, who weighed in five bass totaling 12 pounds, 7 ounces, to earn their spot on Team USA Bass at the 2022 Pan American Bass Fishing Championship, alongside Jacob Wheeler, John Cox, Mark Daniels Jr., Dustin Connell, Brian Latimer, Scott Martin and other top pros.
Keep America Fishing™ is leading the fight to preserve our right to sustainably fish on our nation’s waterways. As the voice of the American angler, Keep America Fishing works to keep our public resources – our oceans, lakes, rivers and streams – open, clean and abundant with fish. For more information, please visit KeepAmericaFishing.org.
For complete details and updated information, visit MajorLeagueFishing.com. For regular updates, photos, tournament news and more, follow MLF’s social media outlets at Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube.
About Major League Fishing
Founded in 2011, Major League Fishing (MLF) brings the high-intensity sport of competitive bass fishing into America’s living rooms on Outdoor Channel, Discovery, CBS, CBS Sports Network, World Fishing Network, Sportsman Channel, and on-demand on MyOutdoorTV (MOTV). According to Nielsen ratings, Major League Fishing remains the number one series on Outdoor Channel for five years and MLF premiered as the number one outdoor show in their time slot on Discovery in 2019.
In 2019 MLF acquired FLW, which expands their portfolio to include the world’s largest grassroots-fishing organization, including the strongest five-biggest-fish format professional bass fishing tour, the MLF Tackle Warehouse Pro Circuit presented by Bad Boy Mowers, as well as the MLF Toyota Series, MLF Phoenix Bass Fishing League presented by T-H Marine, MLF Abu Garcia College Fishing presented by YETI, and MLF U.S. Army High School Fishing presented by Favorite Fishing.