McKinney puts finishing touches on wire-to-wire victory at Lake St. Clair

MACOMB COUNTY, Mich., Aug. 10, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- The Yokohama Bassmaster Elite at Lake St. Clair certainly hasn't been difficult for Trey McKinney, but after three days of competition the second-year pro didn't know how many big smallmouth were left in his best area.

His questions were quickly answered on Championship Sunday as McKinney caught a 6 pound, 2-ounce smallmouth within the first several minutes of fishing, putting the exclamation point on a dominating performance.

The 20-year-old from Carbondale, Ill., claimed his second Progressive Bassmaster Elite Series trophy in wire-to-wire fashion, catching 96 pounds, 1 ounce over four days at Lake St. Clair. It is the heaviest winning weight in Bassmaster competition at Lake St. Clair and the fifth heaviest winning weight in a smallmouth event in B.A.S.S. history. 

"It was an incredible week," McKinney said. "Once I caught those fish this morning, I was so excited. It was a pretty awesome day. When I got to my spot, I made three casts and that 6-2 came up and smoked it." 

The victory just adds to an already stunning resume. In just two years at the highest level, McKinney has two titles (2024 Lake Fork, 2025 St. Clair), nine Top 10s in 17 events and a runner-up finish at the 2025 Bass Pro Shops Bassmaster Classic presented by Under Armour. That doesn't include the four Top 10s he racked up in the 2023 Bassmaster Opens. 

Opening the tournament third in Progressive Bassmaster Angler of the Year, McKinney is now in a tie with Canadian pro Chris Johnston with 690 points heading into the final event at the Upper Mississippi River.

McKinney was in control from the jump at St. Clair, landing 24-11 on Day 1 before adding limits weighing 23-10, 23-15 and 23-13 to his tally the next three days to beat second-place Logan Parks by over 5 1/2 pounds.

"The cool thing about it was, I didn't really have them found. And we fished around everybody. The thing I'm proud of this week is putting my head down and being able to out-fish everyone. It was a really good area if no one else was fishing it, but with everyone out there, you saw a quarter of the fish and they were hard to get to bite. So it was a pretty big achievement to (do that)."

Spending most of his tournament on the outer edges of Anchor Bay, targeting patches of short sand grass that mixed with a type of taller vegetation in 15 to 18 feet of water. In the expansive area, the 2024 Dakota Lithium Rookie of the Year caught most of his 4 1/2 to 5-pound smallmouth in a 100-yard stretch of his half mile to mile long drift.

Most of the bass he saw were either single smallmouth or small groups of smallmouth. As the day progressed, those bass would rise in the water column and roam. 

"There is a river that dumps into the lake that carries cold water from the lake above it (Huron). You can't see the current, but I figured it moved through this area," McKinney explained. "I was about a mile from the mouth of the river. It is set up just right with the hard sand and then a (mixture) of sand grass and tall grass. 

"I had one waypoint where I would always see a good one."

In practice, McKinney generated bites with a perch-colored 6th Sense Saltwater Shindo Shad, but as the tournament pressure ramped up in Anchor Bay, he needed to adjust his bait selection. A 6th Sense prototype dice bait paired with a No. 4 Gamakatsu G Finesse hook with a 1/32-ounce nail weight was his best finesse presentation. 

He tossed that bait on a 7-foot-1 medium-fast action St. Croix Legend Tournament X2 with a Lew's Custom Speed Spool spinning reel. He connected his light braid to either a 10-pound Seaguar Tatsu leader or a 10-pound Seaguar Gold fluorocarbon leader. 

"They haven't seen it before," he said. "When they see it, they don't really know what it is. It is weird. As the tournament went on, they got more wise to it."

A smaller jighead minnow setup and a spybait also caught key bass. A St. Croix Legend Tournament was his choice of rod for the minnow. 

His early morning 6-2 on Championship Sunday was by far the biggest smallmouth he landed this week, and it gave McKinney a tremendous boost of confidence for the rest of the day. 

"When I hooked into it, I didn't know it was that big until it fully jumped out of the water," McKinney said. "That fish was unbelievable. When I got my hands on it and in the boat, I about done a backflip."

He wasted no time filling out the rest of his limit, landing close to 20 pounds by 9 a.m. From there, he added several more 4-pounders to his team before noon to reach his final tally. Unfortunately, boat pressure from a local derby scattered the smallmouth in his best area, making for a tough afternoon. 

"Thank goodness we took off early enough to beat those guys there," he said.

Parks claimed his best finish of his Elite Series career, finishing second with a four-day total of 90-6. The Auburn, Ala., pro opened the tournament just above the cutline with 19-12, Parks rocketed up the leaderboard on Day 2 with 25-9 and backed it up with limits weighing 22-5 and 22-12.

"Obviously I would love to be holding the big trophy," Parks said. "I had one of the most unbelievable days of fishing ever on Day 2. I just went from there and stayed in that area."

On Day 1, Parks spent most of his time towards the main lake but moved into the shallows of Anchor Bay on Day 2 and stayed in the area the rest of the tournament. While other places had grass fully covering the bottom, the area Parks found was mostly a hard sand bottom with isolated clumps of grass.

A 1/4-ounce or 3/8-ounce drop shot with a 5-inch Berkley MaxScent Flatnose Minnow in watermelon magic was his best presentation while a 1/4-ounce jighead minnow and a Berkley Stunna also came into play.

On Championship Sunday, Parks saw as many big fish as he had all week but couldn't get them to bite nearly as well as he did on the second day. 

"Yesterday was tough, and I feel like my day was a lot better today," Parks said. "I caught big ones to start out and thought it was going to go down. It was so frustrating because I knew they were there, but they would just follow the bait to the trolling motor but not bite. 

"I saw the biggest smallmouth of my life, and it was 5 feet from me. It nipped the tail of my bait and swam off."

With bags of 22-13, 23-1, 21-2 and 21-1, Kyoya Fujita finished third with a total of 88-1. Fishing pressure took a toll on Fujita's best area, making it harder for him to trick finicky smallmouth into biting. 

"The waves were big today," Fujita said. 

The two-time Elite Series champion primarily used a Jackall King Jimmy Henge, a new dice style bait on a 1/4-ounce drop-shop weight. To winch the smallmouth to the boat, Fujita connected a 16-pound Daiwa fluorocarbon leader to a 30-pound main-line braid. 

McKinney and Rathdrum, Idaho pro Brandon Palaniuk both caught 6-2 smallmouth on Championship Sunday, splitting the daily Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Day and Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Tournament awards, each earning a $1,500 bonus. 

Ontario pro Evan Kung, Kentucky's Matt Robertson and Parks also earned $1,000 bonuses for their daily Phoenix Boat Big Bass of the Day.

Alabama's Tucker Smith earned the $2,000 Rapala CrushCity Monster Bag of the Tournament bonus for his 26-2 limit of smallmouth from Day 2. 

Carl Jocumsen earned the $1,000 BassTrakk contingency award for accurate reporting.

Parks was also the highest place entrant to the Toyota Bonus Bucks program, earning the $3,000 bonus while Paul Mueller earned the $2,000 bonus as the second-highest entrant. 

Fujita earned the $2,500 Yamaha PowerPay bonus for the highest finishing entrant running a Yamaha Outboard while Palaniuk earned a $1,500 PowerPay bonus.

McKinney and Johnston are tied for the Progressive Bassmaster Angler of the Year lead with 690 points with one tournament remaining in the Elite Series season. Fujita is third with 650 points, Wisconsin's Jay Przekurat is fourth with 648 points and Patrick Walters in fifth with 638 points. Taku Ito, Will Davis Jr., Tyler Williams, Parks and Paul Marks round out the Top 10.

The Yokohama Tire Bassmaster Elite at Lake St. Clair was hosted by the Detroit Sports Commission.

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

SOURCE B.A.S.S.