Coming into the fourth stop of the 2023 Malone’s Marine Marshall Bass Super Series at the St. Albans Parks and Recreation Roadside Park on the Kanawha River and we have a ton of compelling stories headed into this derby. From the Team of the Year race heating up, Cup qualifications on the line, the decreased size limit on this tournament and the chance of the river being muddy – there are a ton of different variable in this tournament. 

Team of the Year Race

Brian and Dylan Fitzgerald will look to use home court advantage to gap their lead Team of the Year lead over Michael Samples and Luke Stewart who are looking to hunt them down.

The Fitzgerald’s hold a slim 3 point lead over the second place duo with a finish no worse than 11th this year. They notched two victories, but will need to score another good finish to stay in contention going into the final event of the season.

“I haven’t been on the river, but Dad was out there Tuesday and said it was okay,” said Dylan. “We know they are pumping some water out of Bluestone now, so we are hoping it won’t make it down this far. We want it clear and tough.”

Samples and Stewart have not had a finish all season worse than 6th place and will look to carry that momentum into the fourth event of the season. What is most interesting is you could expect Samples and Stewart to thrive either way in this derby. They’re the type of guys who excel at smallmouth fishing, but can also catch largemouth if need be. The wildcard of it all is, Samples and Stewart have never competed on the river with the Marshall Bass Trail so it will certainly be interesting to see how they fare.

Cup Qualifications

It has been a very interesting race thus far to sneak inside the Top 40 to make the 2023 Marshall Fishing Cup. On the cutline with a total of 187 points is Joey Harper and Brian Harper and they have fished all three tournaments.

Some unusual suspects outside of the cut are two duos you would think will rebound at the Kanawha.

2020 Cup Champions Kenny McSweeney and Randall Fields will look to slide inside the cut after missing the last event. They are currently 21 points out from the cut so they’ll need a decent finish to slide back inside. One could expect them to have good tournament considering they have a decent amount of experience there.

Ricky and Ryan Nottingham are also a duo that has kind of surprised us this year. They are notably one of the powerhouse duos in the state, so if they show up to the Kanawha, one would expect to see them make a solid run in the tournament to slide back inside the cut.

The Field

One entertaining thing from this tournament will be the field size and who shows up and who doesn’t. In the Marshall Super Series you must fish 4 out of 5 tournaments throughout a season to qualify for The Cup and re-qualify for the 2024 season.

Now that being said we have had 11 teams not fish all three tournaments. The real question and entertaining part is seeing how many guys inside the Top 40 in points not show up and how that effects the standings. Tracking these guys down is like pulling teeth so most times you won’t know who is in or who is out until the morning of the tournament. 

Decreased Size Limit

Big hype around the decreased size limit is going around. The tournament staff made a decision to lower the size limit for two reasons. One, they wanted to give more opportunity for anglers to weigh and create more drama throughout the points standings. 

“We felt as if we lowered the size limit, it would allow more teams to weigh and less zeroing. We want to create more storylines and drama in the points standings so we felt as if this might be the best way to go,” said Team President Bailey McKinney.

Another reason being, they wanted those who show up to weigh-in to see fish and they are going to get exactly that whether it be 3 pounders or 10 inch fish, some fish will most certainly hit the scales.

Playing Field

The playing field will be interesting in this one. With cloudy/muddy water coming from Bluestone, the question is how far will that water make it down the Kanawha River or will it even get there? 

What would be the most interesting scenario is if the water made it to Montgomery by Saturday and teams could have the option to fish muddy/cloudy water up there or they could choose to stay in pool to fish cleaner and more stable water. 

I guess we will have to wait and see how the fourth stop of the 2023 Malone’s Marine Marshall Bass Super Series plays out when the field hits the water Saturday morning in St. Albans. Keep up with all things Marshall Fishing on Facebook!