SHREVEPORT – If one had asked Colton Caskey at the beginning of his first collegiate fishing season at LSU Shreveport if he expected to be in the hunt for an individual national championship, he’d of course say “no.”

But that’s exactly where the Riverdale Academy alumnus found himself this past weekend.

Teamed up with junior Mason McCormick, the freshman and his teammate landed a whopping 24.24 pounds of bass on the first day of the Association of Collegiate Anglers national championship to sit in fourth place.

Weights plummeted across the board on Day 2 as the rain rolled in and Pickwick Lake’s current (courtesy of the Tennessee River) shifted, but Caskey/McCormick finished 13th in a 197-boat field.

“We started hot the first day,” Caskey said. “We fished just four spots all day long, and the first two spots, we pulled in 23 pounds.

“On the fourth spot, we casted twice and replaced a four-pounder with a 4.5 pounder.”

That large bag was netted by just 10 a.m. on the first day, and Caskey and his partner decided to practice the rest of the day knowing that rain and current shifts were on their way.

“We were expecting (fish) to start pulling current, so we decided to look for schools (of fish) and other stuff in preparation for Day 2. We thought we’d catch 18-20 pounds based on our practice rounds, but our Day 1 total shocked us.

“On Day 2, the fish just weren’t there or we couldn’t make them bite. They’d get really close to the bait, and they’d kind of hit but wouldn’t eat it. They wouldn’t connect all the way.”

The Day 2 total of 15.90 pounds is still a respectable weight, especially on a tough day of fishing.

The pair ended with 40.14 pounds in the two-day event, not quite enough to push out Auburn University’s national championship boat (45-5).

Caskey’s tournament put an exclamation point on a relatively successful first season that did have its ups-and-downs.

A season that started with a bang (11th on Lake Dardanelle in October) had plenty of obstacles as the pair fished consistently but weren’t often near the top of results lists.

“Mason and I had fun together through our ups and downs,” Caskey said. “We were pretty consistent, we just weren’t where we wanted to be for most of the year. We didn’t bomb any tournaments but also weren’t burning it down at many this year.”

The pair learned each other’s strengths and communication styles throughout the season, which allowed the productive conversation on Pickwick Lake to stop actively fishing on Day 1 and prepare for different conditions on Day 2.

“This was a big adjustment from high school because I was in a position to usually make the decisions, but in college with a partner who was in his third season, I kind of thought I should sit back and learn.

“But to compete in college, both anglers make decisions and bounce ideas off each other. We struggled with that early, but we learned each other’s personalities. We did a great job of fishing free and bounced ideas off each other, which led to the good finish.”

Caskey added that LSUS’s strong performance to end its season – all six boats finished in the top half of the championship field – will solidify the team’s position in the top 10 nationally.

“You really have two things on your mind – finish high in the School of the Year standings and fish well at the championships,” Caskey said. “What we did shows us that we can compete against the best, and some of these guys who are winning professional tournaments.

“It shows us we’re meant to be there.”

Not all of Caskey’s learning came on the water.

He finished the academic year on the Dean’s List and learned plenty about the business of fishing as diesel prices unexpectedly spiked in the last two months of the season.

“I’m pursuing a double major in business marketing and entrepreneurship – and really all fishing is selling yourself as a business,” Caskey said. “We couldn’t do this without our sponsors and our families.
“With how expensive everything is nowadays, you do have to watch what you are doing. We limited ourselves to $50 on boat gas per day, and we conserved and rationed our gas. We’d do things like pull our boat with the truck to the ramp closest to where we knew we’d fish instead of put in at the closest ramp and run the boat across the lake to our spot.”

The pairing of Caskey and McCormick panned out this season, and the strong finish should launch the boat as possibly LSUS’s best heading into 2026-27.

“It’s specifically a testament to Mason because he’s had a different partner all three years,” said LSUS coach Charles Thompson. “This pairing has worked out really well, and it sets up great for next year.

“With our past success, we’re getting some of those elite guys in, and we knew who Colton was before he got here. It’s one thing to bring in a guy who has high upside and will mature in the sport – Colton came in mature and is becoming an elite angler.”

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