Lake Ray Roberts bass tournament, Pilot Point, Aubrey wins
By Abigail Allen
Editor & Publisher
Saturday was a fruitful time on Lake Ray Roberts for the Pilot Point and Aubrey high school bass fishing teams.
The Pilot Point team had wins in all three categories—total weight caught, the biggest fish and team—while Aubrey brought home a sixth-place team finish.
"Seeing anglers progress from freshmen to senior year is astonishing in the amount that they improve over the time," said Matthew Tolnay of the Texas High School Bass Association. "Especially like these kids that just won today. They're younger.
They're under 16. So, that's always neat. It's exciting. I've done it for 11 years, and it never gets old."
The team he referred to, that of Grayson Brown and Kason Magouirk from Pilot Point, was the overall winner for the day.
Their five fish landed them a total of 27.58 pounds with their big fish coming in at 8.63 pounds and qualifying for the Share Lunker Program.
Second place went to Reece Williams and Brayden Brandt of the Collin County HS Bass Club with five fish for a total weight of 18.4 pounds.
"It was kind of slow in the early morning, but we caught the whole bag in about an hour and a half," Brown said. "And then we waited for about two hours to get the afternoon bite back on, and after the afternoon bite we were starting to look for our five keepers. Fortunately, I caught … a fish in about the last 20 minutes and boosted our bag probably 2 to 3 pounds. Overall, it was a good date."
He and Magourik have their eyes on state again.
Magourik worked with the THSBA representatives as they removed a scale for the genetic testing of the Share Lunker Program.
Their boat captain, Mark Mcwhirter, said he's proud of the effort the boys put into the sport and enjoys working with them.
"I thought this might be a magical day for them, and it was," he said.
The additional anglers from Pilot Point to contribute to the team win were Zach Sanders and Keegan DeWitt, caught two fish for 7.01 pounds, as well as Caden David and Garrett Evans' one fish for 2.3 pounds.
Jace Gonzalez was the top scorer for Aubrey, bringing in four fish that totaled 10.19 pounds.
"It went pretty good," he said. "We just kept going back and forth, the same spots. We just kept catching them."
He was briefly in the lead for biggest fish, as well.
The other anglers from Aubrey to contribute to the team's sixth-place finish were Jacie Weger and Jayce Rose with four fish totaling 6.76 pounds; Banks Buck and Brock Temple with three fish for 6.32 pounds; Garrett Whitley's two fish weighing 5.47 pounds; and Blaine Moore and Brayden Hamilton's one fish for 2.48 pounds.
Collinsville High School's Gavin Russell and Russell Carney placed 90th with one fish weighing 1.64 pounds.
For more information about the season's standings as well as future tournaments, visit thsba.net.
