“It will definitely take 25 pounds-plus to win it,” said Dave Murdock, who lives in Sanford, N.C., just 15 minutes from the lake. “Jordan has got some whopper fish in it and there are always some 30-pound sacks weighed in the spring.”

What is phenomenal, Murdock said, is that kind of big bass bonanza carries right on into the summer.

“You can catch them in Jordan. There are 25-pound stringers weighed in the summer.”

Although Murdock and teammate Tony Fofi normally fish the CBC South Carolina Division tournaments, they plan to fish Lake Jordan Saturday because it is so close to where they live.

“I used to live in Sumter (S.C.) and have fished those South Carolina lakes for years,” Murdock said. “We decided to fish the Jordan Lake tournament because we usually do fairly well on the lake.”

Murdock obviously knows South Carolina’s Lake Wateree pretty well, too. He and Fofi weighed in a five-bass limit at 25 pounds even to win the March 7 CBC-SC on Wateree, earning a $12,500 payday – $10,000 for first place plus $2,500 for the Highest Finishing Skeeter Bonus.

Although he did not get a chance to pre-practice on Jordan Lake and it is off limits the week before the tournament, Murdock said the bass are probably the same as everywhere else at this point – up shallow, either spawning or looking to spawn.

“We typically fish the backs of main lake pockets,” he said, “because we feel we have a better opportunity to catch the spawning and pre-spawn fish there.”

Murdock said he and Fofi will target sunken timber in those pockets.

“The water in Jordan raises and lowers anywhere from 3 to 20 feet in a matter of a couple of days, so there are a lot of floating logs and a lot of times they settle in the backs of the pockets and some of them end up sunken there,” he said.

“We usually give the fish a one-two punch. We both don’t fish the same lure unless it is just absolutely the same thing that is catching fish,” Murdock said. “We throw different things to give them a different look, mainly plastics and jigs, with probably some spinnerbaits and a little topwater early in the morning.”

Saturday’s weigh-in should be exciting with a lot of 5-pound, maybe even 6-pound, averages for a five-fish limit.

 

Carolinas Bass Challenge – North Carolina Division

Sat, Apr 4, 2015

Jordan Lake – NC

Farrington Access

Call Brett Collins 803-413-7521

www.carolinasbasschallenge.com