RICHLAND, Wash. — Justin Campbell literally predicted it. He entered Championship Sunday of the Wild West Bass Trail Pro-Am on the Columbia River presented by Tri-Cities, Wash. knowing he’d need a dramatic reversal of fortune to overtake Ronald Mace, who had led since Day 1.
Essentially, Campbell needed another strong performance to match his big Day 2 and Mace had to stumble. That’s exactly how it played out and with a 3-day total of 59.05 pounds Campbell earned his first WWBT trophy.
“I knew what I had to do and I just stuck with it,” Campbell said. “I knew I had to have big fish to even have a chance, so I stuck around high quality.
“It was a pretty slow day and I had a low fish count. I only had 10 bass and no real flurries.”
By the numbers, Campbell caught 17.75 on Day 1 and placed third. In the second round, he turned in his best bag — 20.67 — and rose to second with a 4.49-pound deficit behind Mace. Championship Sunday saw Campbell nearly match that big bag with a limit of 20.63 that gave him winning margin of 3.19.
“I fished downriver, south of the Casey Pond area and I cycled between a smallmouth area and a largemouth area all day,” Campbell said. “I ended up weighing in three largemouth and two smallmouth, including a 4 1/2.
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