MLF Tyler Brinks, Photos by Phoenix Moore
It’s safe to say that Kentucky Lake is back, or at least on a serious upswing. As many expected, Lowrance Stage 5 Presented by Mercury on Kentucky Lake and neighboring Lake Barkley turned into a ledge fishing bonanza with largemouth and smallmouth bass firmly in their summer patterns.
The pros found several ways to target offshore schools, with some shallow approaches mixed in as well. Here’s a deeper look at how the top anglers caught ’em in Kentucky.
1. Jacob Wheeler – 110-13
Jacob Wheeler used a range of baits to maximize his offshore schools, doing most of his Championship Round damage on a football jig with a Rapala CrushCity Cleanup Craw.
After narrowly losing near his home at Stage 4 on Chickamauga and Nickajack to Jake Lawrence, Jacob Wheeler returned the favor and beat the BPT rookie on his home waters. Wheeler won the Qualifying Round and automatically advanced to the final day, ending the streak of recent round-winners failing to win the event. He did it with a traditional offshore approach, fishing many different schools with various lures.
“The whole key this week was trying to find some places that nobody else had, and the pattern developed throughout the week,” he said. “The current was moving fast, putting a lot of the bass on secondary ledges where the current wasn’t as hard. Once I figured that out, I was able to get dialed in and expand, and getting out ahead early in the event allowed me to spend the rest of my time looking for more places and eliminating water.”
Some of what he found while practicing during tournament hours allowed him to add more fish when it counted most on the final day. He estimated that 40 pounds of his final tally came from areas he found during the event. His bait rotation consisted of several options, including a 5.4-inch green shad Rapala CrushCity Freeloader.
“That’s a new size that will be out at ICAST, and I fished it with a 5/16-ounce VMC Hybrid Swimbait head,” he said. “Then I caught quite a few on a CrushCity Janitor in green pumpkin magic on a Neko rig with a #2 VMC RedLine Neko hook and a 3/16-ounce VMC Half Moon weight. I also caught some cranking with a Rapala DT16 in big shad and citrus shad, and the final day, I caught quite a few with a 3/4-ounce Jewel football head jig with a CrushCity Cleanup Craw, both in green pumpkin shades.”
2. Jake Lawrence – 78-6
Like many in the Top 10, Jake Lawrence found success with the ol’ ball-and-chain on his home lake.
The local favorite nearly made it two wins in a row but ultimately finished as the runner-up. His vast knowledge of the lake and ability to get ahead quickly in the early rounds allowed him to have many options and places to fish.
“Early in the week, we had a lot of current generation that had a lot of the fish pushed off of the main river and onto secondary stuff like little bars and creek channel swings,” he said. “Watching the current generation schedule, I saw that it was slowing, and I figured I could get ahead of the fish and get back out to the main river stuff, but it didn’t work out. Most of my tournament was spent practicing and looking for new schools. I had over 50 different places, but I didn’t get to all of them because of time.”
Focusing primarily on the 9- to 14-foot range, Lawrence used a variety of ledge fishing staples like a crankbait, Scrounger head, mop jig, and a Carolina rig.
“You could get some to bite a plug if you could wind it through the school, but once you hooked one, the whole school would follow and mess it up,” he said. “Because of this, I spent much of my time dragging either a 5/8-ounce Buckeye Lures Mini Mop Jig or a Carolina rig – probably the biggest player of the week. I fished a little creature bait with a 1-ounce weight; it seemed the best way to get multiple bites from a school.”
3. Brent Ehrler – 69-8
Brent Ehrler mixed a drop-shot in with several reaction baits to finish third.
After the Knockout Round, Brent Ehrler predicted that it would be a two-horse race between Wheeler and Lawrence, and that everyone else would be fishing for third place. That proved correct, and despite a challenging practice, he fared the best of everyone else. His summertime TVA experience played a role in his success.
“It’s Kentucky Lake in June, so I did what you must do in these events and idled for 30 hours straight in practice. I put 45 hours on my boat in this tournament alone,” he said. “I didn’t stop to fish unless something looked good, and this time, the fish were sucked down tight to the bottom because of the faster current and hard to see when side scanning. That took me a while to figure out, and I wish I knew that earlier in the event.”
Ehrler also said there was no rhyme or reason to where the fish would be. He found some on the heads of points, some on the downriver side, and others on flat bars.
“I had a bait rotation at every spot and would start with a reaction bait, either a Lucky Craft 3.5XD in pearl threadfin shad or a 1/2-ounce white hair jig,” he said. “I swapped out my trebles on the crankbait to Gamakatsu EWG hooks; I like that style when dragging a crankbait into the hard bottom on the TVA. After throwing the reaction baits, I’d slow down with a 3/4-ounce Buckeye Lures Football Jig with a Yamamoto Yama Craw as the trailer, both in green pumpkin, or a drop-shot with a morning dawn 6-inch Roboworm Straight Tail Worm on a 1/0 Roboworm Rebarb hook and a 1/4-ounce Ark Tungsten drop-shot weight.”
4. Jacob Wall – 62-13
Jacob Wall used his ledge fishing skills to notch his third Top 10 of the season.
Jacob Wall has had a rollercoaster of a year, starting the season with two Top 10s followed by two subpar events. But he rebounded with a solid finish on Kentucky Lake. He did it with several offerings and mixed them at different times during the event to use his forward-facing sonar as part of his strategy.
“My pattern this week was pretty simple, focusing on shell bars offshore and not necessarily ledges,” he said. “It was anywhere the fish were, and I scanned all kinds of things in practice, from slight depressions on the bottom to places where the channel would kick out or hook. I didn’t catch fish on primary river ledges like you normally do on the Tennessee River lakes.”
He fished some around Kenlake State Park early in the event, but the final three days were spent close to tournament headquarters on the lake’s northern end.
“During my forward-facing period, I could catch them on a minnow with a Dirty Jigs Guppy Head in sizes from 1/8 ounce to 1/4-ounce, but the Carolina rig was my main deal the rest of the time,” he said. “I’d drag a creature bait around when I couldn’t use forward-facing sonar, but I also caught some on ledge-style baits like crankbaits, hair jigs, and a 6-inch line-through swimbait.”
5. John Hunter – 62-10 (26)
Kentucky pro John Hunter secured his best finish of the season in his home state by fishing with a traditional offshore approach.
“I was looking for hard-bottom areas offshore – places where the current hits and gives them a place to feed,” he said. “Most of my fish came in that 12 to 17 feet zone, and I stayed north of Jonathan Creek the whole time.”
Hunter had four primary lures in rotation: a Carolina rig with a 3/4-ounce Googan Tungsten weight and a green pumpkin Googan Baits Dart, a deep diving crankbait, a jighead minnow and a chrome Nichols Bass Mafia Big Larry Spoon.
6. Adrian Avena – 53-11
Adrian Avena earned his first Top 10 of 2025 thanks in large part to a football jig.
Fishing about as far south as he could due to the tournament boundaries, Adrian Avena committed to the offshore bite. He also quickly realized that areas aside from the main river ledges had good fish populations.
“I stayed within 5 miles of the bridge that marked our cutoff for the event and never went shallow,” he said. “I tried to stay off the main river and focused on the secondary stuff in 10 to 16 feet of water. I mixed in a lot of different baits – some on a magnum spoon, some on a hair jig, and some on crankbaits and football jigs.”
His crankbait was a Berkley Dredger 17.5 in various colors, and he opted for a 3/4-ounce PB&J football head, which he says accounted for the bulk of his weight total. He added a Berkley PowerBait MaxScent Stank Bug on the back of his jig.
7. Cole Floyd – 51-11
Cole Floyd put his Kentucky Lake knowledge to good use and notched his third straight Top 10 on the Bass Pro Tour.
Ohio’s Cole Floyd has a wealth of experience on Kentucky Lake and dominated the Phoenix Bass Fishing League LBL Division as he rose the tournament ranks, with three straight AOY titles from 2017-19. His approach this week was to use prime ledge fishing tactics.
“I did the normal summertime ledge fishing stuff, fishing the drops that were anywhere from 10 to 16 feet deep,” he said. “I was mixing it up with different baits, but probably 90 percent of my fish came on a chartreuse and blue back Strike King 6XD.”
Exclusively fishing near the tournament’s southern boundaries, Floyd also mixed in a big worm.
“I caught some on a green pumpkin Strike King Bullworm and stayed south; that’s home to me.”
8. Spencer Shuffield – 44-11
Spencer Shuffield adjusted his bait selection as the event progressed. Photo by Tyler Brinks
Spencer Shuffield earned his first Top 10 finish of the year by fishing offshore and sticking relatively close to the takeoff site at Kentucky Dam Marina. He utilized a variety of lures and keyed in on the 17- to 22-foot depth range.
“The first day, I caught everything on a little finesse football jig on a spinning rod,” he said. “Then the rest of the days, it was mainly on a drop-shot. I used a new nine-strand, 15-pound Yo-Zuri braid that’s about to come out with a leader of 12-pound Yo-Zuri T7 fluorocarbon for the jig and 10-pound for the drop-shot. I also caught some ‘Scoping with a minnow and mixed in a Carolina rig with a Zoom Baby Brush Hog.”
9. Andy Montgomery – 35-15
Andy Montgomery was the lone member of the Top 10 to fish shallow and the only one to spend much of his time on Lake Barkley.
Andy Montgomery got some attention for not turning on his forward-facing sonar for the entire event – he shared that he hasn’t used it all since the first event of the year on Lake Conroe. This marked his best finish of the season, and he accomplished it by fishing docks.
“The first day, when it was cloudy and rainy, I caught them on a white 1/2-ounce Strike King Rattling Thunder Cricket that’s coming out soon with a Strike King Menace Grub on the back,” he said. “The rest of the tournament, I was skipping docks with a 1/2-ounce Strike King Skipping Jig in white and green pumpkin with a Strike King Rage Bug trailer on both of them.”
He focused on large docks in marinas or solo docks in other areas and fished both Kentucky and Barkley Lakes.
“I’d say it was about 50/50 for which lake produced the most fish,” he said. “The first day, it was all Barkley; after that, it was both lakes.”
10. Michael Neal – 29-10
Ledge fishing guru Michael Neal kept things simple this week, mixing in a Carolina rig, drop-shot and deep-diving crankbait as he plied the depths.
“I was looking for places where the schools were set up, and that seemed to be points, bends and on straight bars,” he said. “I spent a lot of time in practice idling and looking for those places, and it seemed like the best depths for me were between 12 and 14 feet.”
He used a 3/4-ounce weight on his Carolina rig and a Big Bite Baits Trick Stick in the green pumpkin dirty chartreuse tail color. For his drop-shot rig, he opted for a 6-inch Roboworm Straight Tail Worm in red crawler, and his crankbait of choice was a faded chartreuse and blue SPRO Outsider Crank DD 80.
Post Presented By Southern Fishing News and These Sponsors:
Alabama B.A.S.S. Nation (http://albassnation.com/)
Slider Lures (www.sliderfishing.com)
Neese Waterfront Real Estate (www.neesere.com)
Bass Assassin Lures (http://bassassassin.com)
EGO Fishing (https://egofishing.com)
Motley Fishing (https://motleyfishing.com)
Frankey’s Marine (https://www.facebook.com/FrankeysMarineService)
Vantage Tackle (https://vantagetackle.com/)
