By Evan Merrill

Mt Carmel Register

MOUNT CARMEL — When Clayton Halbig and Luke Dardeen of the Lawrenceville Lunkers traveled to Kentucky Lake to compete in the 2019 Mossy Oak Fishing High School Championship they made a huge splash within the community, sparking a buzz around a sport with a seeming shroud.

But their appearance was just the latest in the line of developments within a growing sport both at the high school level, as well as the collegiate level.

Witnessing such an exponential growth in recreational sports, Wabash Valley College Administration sponsored the team of Clayton Halbig and Luke Dardeen for their appearance in the national tournament to see if the sport would be a good fit for the College Athletic Department and Co-Curricular goals.

Scholarship opportunities; 'limitless' opportunity for anglers?

As with everything in life, money makes the world go round and that certainly applies to such a costly sport as fishing and certainly in a young person's decision in attending college.

To be able to compete in bass fishing, one would already be able to use their personal fishing supplies. Between a boat, tackle, rod, those expenses will be on an individual if they're interested in joining the team.

As for the team, Gill's eyeing to fill out a team of 12, six boaters and six co-anglers. It's important to note that the team is co-ed, so they'll be recruiting both young men and women. He did add that there are scholarship opportunities available, as well as potential fundraising which would help offset some of the expenses such as the travel, food, among others.

"A lot of these schools are not yet offering support from a financial aspect and I feel that Dr. Fowler has afforded us the opportunity to be very marketable to our area students by being able to provide," Gill said. "We're going to be able to provide some tuition scholarships to some of the students that participate and addition to that, there's going to be some responsibility on the club's behalf to do some fundraising to offset some of our expenditures."

For those who elect to join the newly founded team, there's an immense opportunity for exposure. The aspiring anglers will be competing with other anglers from across the country, from the University of Alabama to McKendree University.

Coupled with that, such exposure could allow for the college's anglers to find a home beyond Wabash Valley to fish at — if they so choose. Being as open as it is, it's truly an unprecedented level to compete at.

"Obviously being at a community college, some of these kids are going to choose to move onto four-year universities," Gill said. "First exposure opportunity, one, when they're going to be competing there's going to be college coaches there that are going to be looking at the standings, seeing what teams and what kids are doing well and potentially have the opportunity to move on to one of those four-year universities and continue their collegiate career."

They'll have the opportunity to fish at whichever circuit they elect to, whether it be the Bass Circuit, the FLW or the Cabela's.

Gill said their choice as to a circuit is something that could vary year to year, and would be motivated by the best chance for exposure for their young anglers. Though the full competitive series won't begin until the spring of 2021, Gill says the tournaments in the fall will serve as great experience for his team as they find their footing as a new program.

"Next fall when we get going we'll probably have two or three open style tournaments we can participate in, if I can get things going we may even, we have the ability to go through the Cabela series you can get a sanctioned tournament and host. I don't know if we can pull that off in the next year or not, but I'll try to get the kids exposed to some things next fall. It'll be a good opportunity with this being a new program to get things settled."

Gill's son, a senior who's a member of the Lunkers, said the team will afford incredible opportunities for young anglers such as himself. Whether it be pursuing a job as a professional bass fisher on the Bass Pro Tour or finding a niche in some form of the industry, this allows them the slither of opportunity.

"It's creating an environment for me to be able to fish on a team with teammates that care as much about the sport as I do and potentially compete competitively on the national level and get exposure. ...," Drew Gill said. "This is something that I'm going to do for the rest of my life. Whether it be regionally, tournaments, it's something that I want to compete in for the rest of my life."

Todd Gill did add he'd be preaching that part of it to his team, teaching them how to build and flourish contacts in the industry.

"The exposure these kids are going to get from beyond four-year universities but businesses within the industry is going to give the kids an unlimited opportunity if they choose to take it, to get exposure to fish beyond Wabash Valley College if they want to, fish professionally or making contacts with people in the fishing industry if they want to make a career," Gill said. "I see the limits being limitless so to speak I guess.

"I'm going to try to be a coach and a leader beyond bass fishing and life, to show them the things they need to do to meet people and have conversation that's not on their phone, be able to meet people. Hopefully that'll help them beyond Wabash Valley and whatever they do in life, whether it's fishing professionally, working in the industry or being like myself, a dad who's been able to enjoy being out on the water with my kids."

Gill's experience, weighing duties

Being a head coach is something that's certainly a new experience to Gill, though he is experienced in the bass fishing world.

Gill's been a longtime standing member of Mount Carmel's Hanging Rock Bass Fishing Club, the same club whose members Steve Wells and Brian Frederick spearheaded the founding of the Lawrenceville Lunkers high school team.

Despite reclusing himself from fishing and the club as his family started to grow, it was only a matter of time for Gill to become reinvolved with the club and spread his passion of fishing onto his son and others.

"As a kid I grew up fishing farm ponds with my dad," Gill said. "My grandma had a couple ponds so I kind of got started fishing with him. When I moved to Mount Carmel I got involved with the Hanging Rock Club, got in some bass tournaments, fished there for some years. As my family grew I got away from it for some years, but the last several years as Drew has gotten older and more involved, he and I have fished on the USA Bass Circuit."

The father-son tandem posted some impressive showings on the USA Bass Circuit, and the younger Gill would join the Lunkers fishing team.

So between fishing at a variety of lakes throughout the United States in recent years and his experience in competitive fishing, it's something the eldest Gill has always been around. Now his primary motivation in it is quality father-son time.

"I recognize that my time with my kids is limited, so it just caused me to be passionate about my time with them. While it's going to keep me busy, it's not something I'm wishing away."

Hitting the recruiting trail, heading into next year

Though Todd Gill's certainly not a shy person, often saying he's never met a stranger, the recruiting aspect is something that's a new area for Gill.

If he so chooses, he has a good starting base within the Lunkers organization, but also said he wants to balance the local element with recruiting the best anglers out there, eyeing for this team to be as competitive and successful as possible. He added that Steve Patberg and Emily Waterbury will be serving instrumental roles in the recruitment aspect.

"I'm hoping the first of the year — I don't want to give any hints here — but a couple of our local students that have interest to get things going there," Gill said. "Once the high school season gets rolling I intend to meet as many of the coaches as we can and I intend to get in contact with the Illinois Bass Association that runs that and get contacts with all of the teams associated with that."

"I don't necessarily say we're only going to pull locally too. We want to be competitive but obviously be available as a community college to our area students as well. We'll see how it goes. It's something that's going to be new to me, I'm not a stranger to really anybody and I'm not afraid to go out, extend a hand and be told no."

A factor that should help Gill in that regard — Illinois is adjacent to some of the premiere bass fishing states in the country. Whether it be Indiana or Kentucky, there's certainly plenty of pull close to Wabash Valley.

Indiana in particular stands out, as the state has largest number of Bass Nation members of any state in the country.

"I feel like our college is positioned geographically in a great location to be marketable for this sport," Gill spoke of the geographic factor. "When you think about that, of all of the states in the United States, we're adjacent to them with the most Bass Nation members."

To assist with some of the recruiting, Gill hopes to host a local high school fishing tournament where they'll potentially offer scholarship opportunities to the victors of the tournament — if they choose to claim them and attend WVC.

He's been in talks with the city of Olney to potentially host the tournament at East Fork Lake in Olney. As of now the tenative date for the Wabash Valley College Ice Breaker 2020 High School Bass Invitational is Saturday, March 21 beginning at 7 a.m.

Gill also added that the program plans to host a professional bass fisher to come and speak to kick things off. Though he wouldn't unveil who the angler was, he did reveal that he's a top 80 angler in the United States.

Commitments will likely flow in throughout the first half of 2020 leading into the program's first year as Gill establishes the program from the ground up. But when it finally gets going in the fall of 2020, Gill's ecstatic to get the ball rolling and field a stellar product on the lake. Though there'll certainly be growing pains in their first year, the sky's the limit in a sport that continues to expand.

"I'm very blessed to get an opportunity to teach here and feel blessed that Dr. Fowler has supported me in this endeavor to get a college bass team here. I feel it's going to be a great addition to the college and I'm looking forward to seeing how it goes."