Founded this spring by Steve Loraus, the ISU Bass Club has competed in two tournaments this fall and plans to compete in a number of tournaments next spring.

Loraus, the club’s president, contacted the Sports Club Council about creating a new club.

“This is a totally new club. When this first started, there were seven guys really interested in it,” Loraus said. “I went to the adviser of the council and he told me that I needed to conduct an informational meeting. When we had our first meeting, the bylaws and rules were conducted and officers were elected. We have somewhere between 20 to 25 people right now.”

The most recent tournament the club completed was on Oct. 5 in southwest Iowa.

“We took the people that have boats and took the people that don’t have boats. Non-boaters got paired up with boaters,” said Keith Donnelly, vice president of the club. “You went out and fished throughout the day and you wrote down the length of the fish and we tally up the scores.”

The first tournament the club completed was on Sept. 29 and is referred to as a ‘paper tournament.’ Donnelly said the club was the only group that competed.

“We fished at two big quarries in southwest Iowa. We divided the members into teams and we met at the Hilton Coliseum parking lot at around 5 a.m.,” Donnelly said. “We told the groups that they can fish wherever they wanted to fish. If you catch a fish that is bigger then 12 inches, you have to write the length. The other members of your group verified the length. Everybody met back at 6 p.m. and if a group was late, they were docked points.”

After the first two tournaments, Loraus is in the lead in the point standings with 200. Coming in second is Brad Belser with 180, followed by Matt Hanson with 170.

Tournaments the team will compete in next spring will be on March 30 and will include a paper tournament. Donnelly said the tournament is a time for club members to get to know each other.

“There’s a tournament on April 5 at Brushy Creek, which is located south of Fort Dodge, and that’s going to be against other collegiate fishing teams,” Donnelly said. “Other dates next spring will be on April 12 and that’ll consist of a points tournament and we’ll have the Cyclone Classic on April 26. What the members will do is they’ll keep the three biggest fish they caught, put them in a live well, and we’ll weigh them for points.”

Loraus said a majority of the club consists of amateur fishers and that the club is searching for area sponsors.

“We are an amateur club. We have had four that have competed in national tournaments,” Loraus said. “Right now we’re in the process of looking for area sponsors. It’s not a problem right now. We just haven’t applied for them right now.”

Loraus said there are nine Big 10 schools that have a fishing team but he hasn’t found any Big 12 school that has a team.

As far as affiliation with any other clubs, Donnelly said the club currently doesn’t have one.

“There’s the Tri-County Bass Club out of Marshalltown, [which] is like a brother club to us,” Donnelly said. “If we have any questions or any problems, we can go to Todd Reed, who’s a big member of the Tri-County club. Todd helps us if we run a tournament.”

Students can find out about the club at a meeting on November 13 in 8 p.m. in Beyer Hall room 101. The club’s Web site is www.scc.iastate.edu/~bass.