CARTERVILLE (WSIL) -- McKendree University has a bass fishing team and they are pretty good.
Last year they were named school of the year.
There are four divisions at the collegiate level and you accumulate points. That determines the school of the year.
A week from today McKendree will be in Alabama for the final tournament of the year.
Benton's Trevor McKinney and Carterville's Blake Jackson play key roles on the team and look to bring home another championship.
"The purpose of us fishing, really fishing in college is to win school of the year and we were lucky enough last year to win school of the year and it was a huge accomplishment for our team at McKendree and every one of us want to win again and starting last year right after we won we worked hard to win two years in a row," McKinney said.
"A lof of fishing in tournaments is gut decisions and when you do it a whole bunch there's little things you learn and the biggest thing is staying sharp on everything, your casting axis, the list runs through," Jackson said.
"The good thing for us is we are going to be down there for seven days total so we will have 3-4 days to pre-fish."
They'll look to stay sharp but how do you not overthink it?
"Past knowledge, years of experience on certain bodies of water. Me and Trevor have been there five times down there at Pickwick and this will be my fourth trip down so all that knowledge we've accumulated over those twenty to thurty days of been fishing on that body of water, taking that knowledge and studying. People don't think you can study fishing. The biggest thing is studying up on it and when you are down there don't waste any time, spend as much time on the water when you are down there, don't be messing around."
And they are locked in.
"When you are thinking of something, and you start catching fish, that's when you know you're in the zone," McKinney said.
"You have a lot of confidence in the bait you are throwing, catching fish and any time you are catching fish, me personally I'm in the zone because I'm super focused."
