Schneider and Schertz Win Oconto Pro Team Challenge
OutdoorHub 07.30.14
As predicted by Brett King, the AIM Pro Team Challenge at Oconto, WI on the bay of Green Bay was a shoot-out. With many of the teams struggling to hold a consistent weight due to a tough bite, any of the 62 teams could easily make a comeback for the $22,000 first place prize.
It would be John Schneider and Nick Schertz who would hold rise to the top on the third day and take the win with a total of 111.97lbs. Fishing on the southern flats, they almost didn’t find their active school on the last day. “Either they are there or they are not,” said Schertz. “You know on one pass. We had five minutes left of a forty minute pass when we got on them.” They had three fish on the card by 9:45am before hitting a 2 1/2 hour lull.
They then made a move to the inner bay, where they had caught three fish on the first day of the tournament. Within three passes they put another four fish on the card by pulling harnesses in less than five feet of water. With 42.39lbs, they were able to edge out the father and son team of Brett and Lucas King.
Team King had spent most of their day trolling crawlers over the Shark Fin. In the first ten minutes of the day they had a triple, including a 28 3/4 inch beast for the scorecard. There was a brief moment of fear when the head of one of the nets fell off the yoke and into the water, but Lucas recovered it, screwed it back on and all the fish were landed. Grinding out their area, they kept adjusting their baits higher in the 18 feet of water they were fishing over and kept plucking away. They put their last fish on the card at 2:40pm to end the tournament with 105.59lbs and $13,000. They were also excited to receive an additional $1500 in Warrior Cash from Warrior Boats!
For Brad Davis and David Woyak, #7 Willow blades were key to their presentation. They put 101.15lbs of fish on their card over three days to take home third place honors and a check for $8,000. The most important thing was being over active fish, which they had going in two locations.
They spent their mornings fishing just off bottom in 15 feet of water by Dykesville. In the afternoon they would fish 20 feet down in 30 feet of water by the Shark Fin.
The field officially registered over 3200lbs of walleyes each day. Up to seven fish can be registered by each team daily. The tournament paid out over $60,000 in cash for the top 12 places.
AIM uses a catch-record-release format where anglers measure and photograph each walleye they catch and write it down on the official AIM scorecard. All fish are immediately released.
