Johnston Coike's his way to Bassmaster Elite Series victory at Santee Cooper Lakes

CLARENDON COUNTY, S.C., May 17, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Ever since joining the Progressive Bassmaster Elite Series, Chris Johnston has wanted to win a tournament centered around southern largemouth. 

The Peterborough, Ontario native achieved that goal this week by winning the Yokohama Tire Bassmaster Elite at Santee Cooper Lakes with a four-day total of 113 pounds, 12 ounces, breaking away from second-place Brandon Palaniuk to earn his second blue trophy and the $100,000 first-place prize, a margin of victory of 19-12.

"I've been pegged as a smallmouth guy up north, but I have been very consistent with these southern fisheries and had some close calls with Bassmaster," Johnston said. "So, to win one in this fashion is unbelievable. To have the week I had, catching 5-,6- and 7-pounders the whole time, you couldn't ask for anything more.

"I don't think I've ever been that dialed in a tournament ever."

Not only is it Johnston's second career Elite Series win, his first coming at the St. Lawrence River in 2020, but he also earned his second career Century Belt and became the third angler to earn a belt on both a smallmouth fishery (St. Lawrence River in 2023) and a largemouth fishery. 

Lakes Marion and Moultrie have now produced nine Century Belts since the inaugural 2006 Elite Series season, and Johnston's four-day total is the second-highest winning weight after Preston Clark's 115-15 beatdown in 2006. 

The 10th-year-pro's game plan centered around main lake docks in less than 10 feet of water that Johnston believes harbored resident largemouth. Because of the abundance of vegetation and cypress trees, those docks are often ignored, making them a perfect option in this tournament.

"I don't think they get a lot of pressure, and I don't think there are a lot of bass that live on them," the two-time reigning Angler of the Year said. "There aren't really any spawning pockets nearby. But the ones that do live there are big ones."

He skipped and pitched a Hideup Coike Fullcast under those docks, a bait he said very few of those Santee Cooper bass have seen. He rigged it using a Gamakatsu treble hook and pushed a 1/8-ounce tungsten sinker into the bottom of the bait so the buoyant material would sink.  

Although it was a non-forward-facing sonar event, Johnston applied the concepts he learned from using the bait with his Garmin LiveScope. To keep the bait above the heads of the bass, he would count down to his desired depth and then begin his presentation.

"As soon as I felt it was in the depth range I wanted, I would jerk it. I learned from watching on LiveScope that usually would get the fish's attention. Then if you give it a double twitch, that gets the bass aggravated. It was almost like working a jerkbait."

For the tight-quarters style of fishing, Johnston used a 7-foot-3 medium-heavy Daiwa Tatula Multi-Purpose casting rod paired with an 8:1:1 Daiwa Tatula SV baitcaster and tied his Coike to 22-pound Seaguar Tatsu fluorocarbon.

"I could have just put one rod on my deck," he remarked.

He discovered his pattern on Lake Moultrie his first day of practice, receiving a 4-pound bite before shaking off two more quality bass. Day 1 on Moultrie was a struggle, forcing Johnston to move into Lake Marion, where he finished out a 21-3 limit. The upper lake is where he would spend the rest of his tournament and sacked up 32-8 on Day 2 (the Rapala CrushCity Monster Bag of the Tournament) before backing it up with 29-2 and 30-15 the final two days.  

Johnston opened Championship Sunday by catching a 6-pounder, filling out a decent limit before making a long run up Lake Marion to a new area. There, he tossed his Coike up under a dock and hooked up with a 7-7, the Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Day. Once he got it in the boat, he knew it would be hard to be beat by anyone in the Top 10. 

"I set the hook and it didn't move," Johnston explained. "It started going sideways and it must have gone around four different poles. My line was one way and it jumped 4 feet to the right of that. Somehow, it swam back through all the poles and to the boat. My small one was 3 pounds at that point."

The rest of the day was icing on the cake, as he caught two more weighing around 5 pounds and another 6-pounder to cull one of those 5-pounders. 

"I had one of the best afternoons of the week as far as catching fish goes," he said. "I wish I had two more hours."

Palaniuk called Jack's Creek on the north side of Lake Marion home this week, landing limits weighing 29-1, 29-15, 20-11 and 14-5 to notch his fourth Top 5 at Santee Cooper, his best finish at the fishery since winning in the fall of 2020. 

"It was an incredible week," Palaniuk said. "The first two days were some of the best days I've had on this place. Really, they were some of the most fun days I've had fishing. Today, I would have had to have had 34 pounds to win. I'm glad (Chris) caught them that well, it eases the pain. What makes me mad though is that I've had the chance to break 100 twice, basically punts, and I screwed it up both times."

Each year, the Idaho pro has taken a new approach to the fishery. This year, he targeted shallow cypress trees harboring postspawn largemouth. A certain contour break and a mix of vegetation were key ingredients for finding high percentage groups of trees. 

"There was a combination of dollar pads, star grass and some other fluffy stuff," he explained. "If there were dollar pads around and a little bit of scattered star grass, that's where the big ones wanted to be. Only a few places had that."

A Hideup Coike Fullcast produced the bulk of his bites the first two days. Later on Day 2, a 6-pounder tore up his last Coike, so he switched to a homemade urchin-style bait. Since his homemade one wasn't as buoyant as the Coike, he had reservations about how effective it would be, but within the first couple casts using it he landed a 4-pounder. 

He used the same hook in both, a BKK Spear 21 treble hook, but used a 3/32-ounce X-Zone tungsten nail weight in the Coike while the other he left weightless. 20 or 22-pound Seaguar Tatsu fluorocarbon kept Palaniuk from breaking off around the thick cover. 

With limits measuring 21-8, 24-14, 25-11 and 20-8, Georgia pro Drew Cook finished third with a total of 92-9. The 2022 Santee Cooper Lakes champion once again fished for spawning largemouth on Lake Marion, although it was much harder to find areas where bass were spawning this go-round than in 2022. 

Most of the time, he sight-fished in clearer water areas with a mix of vegetation in short pockets. Some other quality bites came around cypress trees and docks where he had shaken off bites in practice. 

"It was strictly bed fishing and we milked it for all it was worth," Cook said. "There would be a pocket in a creek that really wouldn't look that good and they were all in there. You'd go to the next pocket, and there would be nothing in there. I just had to hunt and peck around."

The 2020 Rookie of the Year rotated through three baits this week. A Spro Wacky Snack was the most productive of the bunch the first three days while a Nories Front Flapper was his sight-fishing bait of choice. He also mixed in a Coike around a variety of cover elements.  

Wisconsin pro Kyle Norsetter earned Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Tournament honors with a 9-14 he caught on Day 3, earning a $3,000 bonus. The 9-14 is also the Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Year, which pays out $10,000 at the end of the season. Additionally, Norsetter earned another $1,000 for catching the daily big bass on Day 1 while Palaniuk (8-6) and Johnston (7-7) also cashed $1,000 bonuses for their daily big bass on Days 2 and 4.

Johnston earned $2,000 for the Rapala CrushCity Monster Bag of the Tournament while John Crews Jr. took home the $1,000 BassTrakk Contingency bonus for accurate reporting.

Cook claimed the $4,000 Toyota Bonus Bucks contingency for highest-placing eligible angler while Alabama's Kyle Welcher earned $3,000 as the second-place angler.

Palaniuk also won the $2,500 Yamaha Power Pay contingency award for the highest-placing eligible angler. Cook earned the $1,500 second-place award.

Canadian pro Cory Johnston leads the Progressive Bassmaster Angler of the Year race with 483 points, followed by Illinois pro Trey McKinney in second with 463 points and Texas pro Dakota Ebare in third with 455 points. Cole Sands is fourth with 454 points; Brandon Cobb is fifth with 446 points; John Garrett is sixth with 443 points; Drew Cook is seventh with 440 points; Caleb Hudson is eighth with 430 points; Bob Downey is ninth with 426 points; and Justin Atkins is 10th with 411 points.

Hudson leads the Pro-Guide Batteries Bassmaster Rookie of the Year race followed by Fisher Anaya in second with 372 points and Pake South in third with 322 points. Tristan McCormick is fourth with 306 points and Matt Messer is fifth with 233 points. 

Clarendon County Chamber of Commerce hosted the tournament.

Media Contact: Mandy Pascal, Communications Manager, 334-414-8677, [email protected]

SOURCE B.A.S.S.