It is very wild to me, that in the very first tournament I covered working for Bassmaster that I would actually get to see another West Virginia angler almost get the win in the tournament. Wil Dieffenbauch lead both Day 1 and 2 at the 2022 B.A.S.S. Nation Championship at Pickwick Lake back earlier in November. While he didn’t win the event, he did finish runner-up in the event and punched his ticket to the 2023 Academy Sports + Outdoors Bassmaster Classic next March in Knoxville, Tennessee.
I would argue Wil’s accomplishment has been one all of us West Virginia anglers can be proud of and will be one we can all talk about for a long time. I was fortunate to get to talk with Wil after the event a little bit, but I didn’t really get to dig in on his history and his thoughts about everything he has going on. So, I decided for this week on ‘The Catch’ I would dive in to see how Wil got into fishing and what has been on his mind since he qualified for the Bassmaster Classic.
Wil has been fishing since he could remember, in fact, there are pictures of him holding bass while he was still in a stroller. Since that bass in the stroller, Wil has been obsessed with the sport of fishing and it has served him well ever since.
“We watched a lot of Bassmaster shows on TV growing up and one day my family had taken me to the mall. There was a section roped off where they had kids casting at targets,” said Dieffenbauch. “So obviously, I had to get in on it. We had seen the little blurb on Bassmaster TV about the CastingKids but really didn’t know anything about it. So I signed up, and they showed me how to flip, pitch, and cast. I did it and we started to walk away to continue our shopping when we were stopped and told I needed to stick around because I was in a three-way tie for the win. To break the tie, they did a cast off and I ended up winning the cast off for the win and was told I had to go to Flatwoods for the state championship later that year.”
That is what fueled the competitiveness in Wil and eventually led him to 5 CastingKids State Championship wins. This is also when he and his father Pic started fishing in small open tournaments together. Those two would eventually go on to win the B.A.S.S. Nation of West Virginia Buddy Trail Team of The Year Title in 2021. Wil would go on to fish in college at Fairmont State and would have a pretty memorable college career over at FLW. He would rack up three FLW college wins as well as three FLW College National Championship qualifications. Wil would continue his fishing career in the FLW/MLF Toyota Series and had seven consecutive qualifications for the Toyota Series Championship from 2014 to 2020.
“Winning the College fishing Northern Regional on Philpott Lake and being on every TV in Wal-Mart every time you walked by the electronics section for months was a big moment for me,” said Dieffenbauch of his winning ways. “The 10th place finish on the Potomac River in the Toyota Series event in 2019 proved to me that I can hang with these anglers.”
But most notably Wil had a pivotal moment in 2013 at the FLW College National Championship on Beaver Lake where he truly felt like he let the biggest tournament of his life slip away. A tournament he feels helped fuel his fire to succeed in the fishing world.
“It is the one tournament I have thought about more than any other in my career. That was my last college event, I had already graduated in December, and I was ready to win the National Championship, qualify to compete in the Forrest Wood Cup, and quick start my fishing career,” said Dieffenbauch. “I was fishing well at the time, I was making great decisions on the water, but it all kind of came to a screeching halt on Day 2 of that National Championship.”
Back in 2013 at the FLW National Championship, after Day 2 of competition they would cut down the field to only the Top 5 and that Top 5 would fish the final day for the National Championship title and Forrest Wood Cup qualification. This was back when the field had the likes of professional anglers such as Brett Pruett, Shane Lehew, Jordan Lee, Dustin Connell, Miles Burghoff, and Mike Huff to name a few.
“In 2013 the Alabama rig was the hot bait winning every tournament including the FLW Tour event on Beaver Lake the week before our tournament,” Dieffenbauch said. “Everyone was slinging the Alabama rig throughout that tournament, but on Day 2 my fishing partner Ryan Radcliff and I found a jig bite and a tube bite. The fish were pre-spawn and were starting to stage up to spawn. We noticed on Day 2 the Alabama rig bite was dwindling and they were starting to target crawfish instead of baitfish. By noon on Day 2, we were going down banks behind guys that were slinging the Alabama rig and catching them with a jig and a tube. In the afternoon a lot of fish started to stack up on secondary points and you could throw a tube out there, let it sit on the bottom, count to 20, reel up, and catch one almost every cast. We knew that we just needed to be fishing on Day 3 and we were going to blow the tournament away because the fish had moved and the Alabama rig was not going to work on Day 3 and we were the only ones that followed the fish.”
Wil and Ryan would miss the cut in that event by just one position and would finish up 6th. There was only one limit caught on the final day and ultimately made Wil sick to think of knowing he was on the right pattern to potentially win the event, secure a National Championship win he dreamed of and start his professional fishing career.
“That tournament messed me up mentally for a few years, but it prepared me for the 2nd place finish at the recent B.A.S.S. Nation National Championship,” Dieffenbauch said of his tournament. “All I had to do was keep mentally focused on that final day, catch another limit like I had been while the weather was right, and I would achieve everything I have been chasing. Although, my mistake of putting the wrong thrust washer on after spinning a hub in practice cost me the win last month and surely has put a chip on my shoulder now towards the Bassmaster Classic.”
Wil Dieffenbauch is set to compete in his first Bassmaster Classic and will be the first West Virginia angler to qualify for the Classic since 2013. While most anglers qualifying for their first Bassmaster Classic would be star-struck, Wil is looking to make some noise for himself in the biggest tournament in bass fishing.
“The magnitude of qualifying for it hasn’t really got to me. I know a lot of my friends and family are super excited for me to be going, but I am just ready to go and focus on figuring out a strategy to win,” said Dieffenbauch. “My whole mindset going into it is that unless you win, especially coming from the Nation tournament, nobody even remembers you were there.”
While Wil not only qualified for the Bassmaster Classic, he also gained free entries into all nine Bassmaster Opens for 2023. He plans to fish all nine in the new Bassmaster EQ series and attempt to qualify for the Bassmaster Elite Series.
“I wasn’t sure if I could financially afford to do all nine or if I would still have a job after taking that much time off. So of course, I spoke with so many different people to get their opinion and the answer has always been the same, ‘You will look back later in life and regret it if you don’t take this opportunity,'” said Dieffenbauch. “Fortunately, everyone at work said the same thing and they are going to work with me on my schedule. I am still trying to figure out how to afford it, so if anyone is in need of a walking, talking billboard that’s traveling the country in 2023 I am your guy.”
