'U' Of M Fisherman Help Put College Fishing On The Map
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – Normally the Gophers' biggest national success comes on frozen water, but a pair of University of Minnesota students recently had a big win out on the lake, bass fishing.
So WCCO's David McCoy went out on the water to hear all about it.
"Basically you just find the weed edge, the heavy milfoil. When it gets later in the year a lot of the bass seem to tuck up in there to get out of the heat," fisherman and 'U' of M student, Austin Felix, said.
There are worst ways to spend a lazy Saturday morning than out fishing on Lake Minnetonka.
"Flip her out every couple feet, and reel 'em back in until you find 'em," Felix said.
But Chris Burgan and Austin Felix consider this work, or at the very least, practice.
"You can go a long ways and not find a lot of anything, and then for a few minutes you'll find a school and it'll be bang bang, bang, bang," Felix said.
"I kind of like to keep a really open mind, kind of let the fish tell you what's going on," Chris Burgan said.
"Catch a lot of big fish doing it this way," Felix said.
Not unlike a college football team, the practice paid off.
In March, on Lake Keowee in South Carolina the duo won the University of Minnesota's first national championship in college fishing.
"Got a really big trophy and a giant plastic check," Felix said.
"Which we got to keep," Burgan said.
That's right, college fishing.
"Pretty much everyone I tell that I'm on the fishing team, are like wait, what's a fishing team? They have no idea," Burgan said.
"Just tell 'em you won a boat," Felix said.
A $30,000 boat, in fact. Felix bought Burgan out of his half of it.
"Which is great, because then I could pay my rent the next month," Burgan said.
No NCAA violation there, since it's a club sport.
No scholarships or big recruiting budgets either, but the club has more than doubled in size since the victory.
"Once we won the championship, word kind of got out that we even had a fishing team," Burgan said.
In fact, the northernmost team to ever win the title.
"It's really a southern dominated sport," Burgan said. "We're the only ones without a southern accent; I'm pretty sure."
It was a three-day tournament, weighing the five biggest fish from each day.
"We caught fish right away in the morning, every single day to calm us down and get us some momentum going," Felix said.
Burgan and Felix ended up winning by a little more than three pounds, and got a nice recognition when they got back to campus.
Right?
"No, we never even got an email from the university saying well done. No congrats. I'm not even sure they realize it happened, to be honest with you," Felix said.
"They had like club awards at the end of the year and we didn't even win one," Burgan said.
But don't feel too sorry for them. Not when this is what it takes to be number one.
