Sometimes in fishing you get to witness special things. This year I got to witness two college anglers from UNCC Charlotte accomplish something beyond special, something that all college anglers strive and work for. Louis Monetti and Michael Fugaro last week “unofficially” became the 2022 Bassmaster College Series Team of The Year. While the points win is still not official yet, I wanted to share this story with everyone. 

Fortunately, I have kept up with Louis and Michael this year just through social media. They proved to me and to a lot of other folks if you put the work in and a keep a never give up attitude you can go a long ways in this fishing game. Below I did a little interview with the guys on their winning year. I hope you guys enjoy and take something away from this.

DockTalkWV: Year and Model of the boat you guys used this year. Give me the specs as well, the motor and year, trolling motor, the graphs (if any), and whatever extra add ons (if any).

The Champs:

Louis- My boat is a 1996 Ranger R72. I believe it’s 17’1”. Google will tell you that it has a 24 gallon gas tank but mine has a 15. The motor is a ‘96 Mercury 115hp 2 stroke, and she’s got an old Motorguide tour edition 24 volt 80lb thrust (greatest trolling motor ever made). I’ve got a Lowrance Gen 2 HDS 8 at the console, and I had a first gen HOOK7 at the front for the Harris Chain but I think I blew the fuse to it and since we don’t use it, didn’t care to fix it. As far as add-ons, there aren’t many that stand out besides the recessed foot pedal tray which should keep me away from back problems for a few more years.

DockTalkWV: How did you guys get started in fishing?

Louis: Like many, my dad got me into fishing at a young age (3 years old) but almost always saltwater. I grew up 5 minutes from the ocean in New Jersey and was obsessed with catching stripers and bluefish my entire childhood. Sometime when I was 11 or 12 my buddy convinced me to come fishing for bass at a pond with him, and after that I became addicted. Being as competitive as I am while being terrible at sports led me to fishing tournaments, and here we are. I’d be doing the guys in my local club, Hooked Bassmasters of NJ, a disservice if not bringing up their influence on how I got to where I am today. Those guys taught me how to play the game the right way, and I am forever grateful for that.

Michael: I had a very different route into bass fishing. Growing up I would sometimes go out fishing in the intercoastal waterways with my grandfather but that was about it. It wasn’t until the summer before my freshman year of college when I got into bass fishing. One day I was bored and got onto Youtube, and one of the first videos I watched was a bass fishing video. I was interested, and did some more research. I went to Bass Pro and got an Ugly Stick spinning rod, some baits and went to my local pond. Ever since then I have been hooked.

DockTalkWV: How did you guys meet?

Louis: Michael will do a better job of explaining this, but basically he hated me for being friends with his girlfriend at the time when they started dating. Once we’d had a few beers together and became buddies, I took him fishing and we’ve been brothers since.

Michael: As Louis said, my girlfriend had been talking about this kid that she was very good friends with, and I was like who is this kid, I don’t like the man. But, when we finally met each other and started hanging out and fishing we became boys, and have been ever since.

DockTalkWV: Kind of just give me a brief overview of each derby before Saginaw. Florida, Norman, and Arkansas.

Louis: I’d be lying if I said we didn’t go into the year with the intention to win Team of the Year, we thought the schedule could set up well for us and I had experience on 3 of the 4 bodies of water. I remember talking in depth about the season on the way down to Florida, and I truly believed that Norman, Norfork, and Saginaw were tournaments we could make a run at, with Florida being a survival event.

We had a ton of confidence going into the Harris Chain, but we knew that there was no way we’d be able to compete with the 25-30lbs a day it would take to win. Because of that, we opted to find and fish offshore grass for a consistent, solid finish.

On Norman, our home lake, we knew spawning fish would play and thought that if things lined up, it was a winnable event. We came up with a two-pronged approach that included fishing for big largemouth on the bed and roaming spotted bass, and it delivered with two more consistent days. Our big spawning fish never came to play, but having something to fall back on on day two really saved our tournament and funny enough, we mostly ran water that was new to us that week.

At Norfork we decided it best to fish the bottom end in the cleanest water, where we felt most comfortable. We honestly felt great going into the event about being able to have two solid 10-13lb days, but thanks to two big bites day one and a terrible, survival day two we were the model of inconsistency there.

A huge theme to all three of those tournaments was just hard work, and a never-give-up attitude. At Harris Chain I landed a 6lber on our last cast of the event, on Norman we found a 2.5lb cruising largemouth with an hour left that bumped us up a pound, on Norfork during the first day we landed back to back 4lb largemouth and caught our 5th fish day two on our very last cast. We knew we had a special thing going after all of that.

DockTalkWV: Tell me about the run you made (if you made one) on Saginaw Bay, that whole experience running in big water in the boat.

Louis: We made the 40-50 mile run on Saginaw to Tawas Bay, after finding two groups of smallmouth there in practice. We had a flat with spawners and a flat with cruisers, and felt like we had to make a run out there because of the quality that we’d seen. My strengths in fishing are smallmouth fishing and sight fishing, so boat aside it was a no-brainer. It was by far the longest run I’d ever committed to making in my boat, and I knew that if we were able to make it there and back that we’d find a way to catch them, even with less than 4 hours to fish.

Besides the big water, which luckily I have some experience with in the ocean and on Lake Ontario, one of our biggest concerns was with gas. I really wasn’t sure if we’d have the gas to make it there and back, and finding places to stop and get it was not easy. We ran at 30mph, 3500rpms, the entire way there and back, just to make sure we had the fuel to do it. There were some seriously close calls, on day 1 we got down to the marina in Linwood while bouncing on E, but we were able to get there and back safely.

Michael: The run both days had to be the worst thing you could ever imagine. Day one I wasn’t smart enough to bring a rain jacket so the whole time running there I was getting soaked head to toe in water. We finally got to our spot on day one and I was experiencing early onset hypothermia. Day two was just as bad, but on the run back, the livewell won’t hold water. 20 minutes into our run back I looked at our fish and they were sitting in a half inch of water, and on their sides. We set the boat down and started taking waves over the bow, while manually shoveling water into the livewell. This occurred 3-4 more times as we continued to make the run back. I cant believe the boat survived, we survived, or those fish survived but somehow we made it back to tell the story.

DockTalkWV: After Day 1 Matt and Lafe Messer had unofficially took the points lead and you guys were just around a pound and some change (I think) behind. What was your thoughts after Day 1 and mindset going into Day 2

Louis: For me personally, I did everything I could to avoid knowing anything about the standings after day 1. We had a little over 17lbs which I knew was very solid, but I also knew it was far from safe and was frankly pretty upset about it at the time. I basically took the night after day 1 to myself, was real quiet (those who know me know I am not that), and tried to mentally prepare myself for day 2. I knew we needed a big bag despite not really knowing what the Messer brothers had, and I knew the only way to do that was to go back out there and fish the best we could. Our teammate and great friend Brycen Hendriks really calmed me down before takeoff on day 2, reminding me that a lot had to go right for us to get to that point, and that if it was meant to be, it’d happen.

Michael: After day one for me, I was personally stoked. I knew that there was a slim chance for us to make that run, and for us to catch a solid bag, so when we pulled it off I was happy. I tried to talk Louis off the ledge that night, but I knew he just needed time to process everything. Going into day 2, I knew what the leaderboards said, so I knew that if we could get out there and get back we would have a solid chance of winning TOY. Louis was in a good headspace idling out to the bay, so I knew all that was left was to catch them.

DockTalkWV: Describe the whole Day 2 from Blast Off to Weigh-In. What did it mean for you guys to win that?

Louis: After talking with Michael and Brycen that morning, I realized that we just had to go out and have fun. I know it sounds corny as can be, but it’s the truth. Finding the fun in fishing has been a huge contributor to our success this year, and there’s nothing I enjoy more than sight fishing for big brown bass. After the run that tried to take all of the fun out of everything, we got to the spawning flat where we caught everything we had on day one. I had hoped for a few new fish to pull up, but we really didn’t find much and left there after about an hour with three fish for no more than 8lbs, all cookie-cutters. We got to the flat where we saw cruisers in practice with about 2 and a half hours to fish, and after not seeing any on the dropoff we went looking in the skinny water.

Eventually we came upon a section of the flat where a weird 2-3” mossy grass grew on the bottom, and the next hour and a half was nothing short of magical. We had a blast, catching or losing 3-4lb smallmouth on what seemed like every other cast. We even had to stop fishing at one point aka Nolan Minor and Casey Lanier (some of y’all will get this). Once we culled out our last fish under 3 and a quarter, we decided it was time to try and get those fish back with the waves building. We gave ourselves a good buffer, and knew that we didn’t have a giant bag, but had one that would require the field to catch ’em pretty good. After a rather eventful run back in, I started asking my buddies what Lafe and Matt had the second we checked in. When I heard, I froze, and knew we had a pretty good chance at shutting the door. Michael got in a rather lengthy bag line, and I waited for what felt like forever for him to get back and bag those fish up. Once I saw 19 flash on the scales, I had a pretty good feeling that we’d gotten it done.

As far as what it means, it’s really hard to put that into words. Fishing for a profession is something I’ve dreamed of for a long time, and winning Team of the Year is something that I felt could really prove myself as an angler. Lord knows what the future holds, but to be at the top of the college fishing world, even for just a moment, is a truly special feeling. The field has gotten stronger with each passing year, and the number of pros who worked through the college ranks as of late really proves the talent that these guys possess. I have the utmost respect for all of them, and I’m most certainly not going to take this title for granted.

Michael: Day 2 is when it really set in for me. I knew that we had a solid chance of getting this done, and was just hoping for everything to go right. When we eventually pulled up off the flat where we saw all those cruisers, it felt like we were just fun fishing. We were losing good ones, and not caring. Catching some good ones and just joking around. For the 2 or so hours that we were out there on that flat, it just felt like we were back in North Carolina messing around on some random weekend. I feel like that was the biggest key to our success. We didn’t let any of the pressure enter the boat the whole day we fished. I feel like that is when we are both at our best. Once we got back into the river, that’s when the pressure truly hit me. I can’t describe the feeling when we got back to the ramp and found out that we had a great chance at this title. For me, not growing up bass fishing or competing in bass fishing tournaments it’s a weird feeling. This was my first year experiencing the college fishing scene, and I can’t thank Louis enough for believing in me. He kept preaching that we were going to get it done, and for it to finally come true is a feeling like no other. We have put blood, sweat and tears (and a whole lot of money) into this crazy thing called bass fishing and for it to finally pay off is the greatest feeling in the world.

Feel free to leave anything else you want mentioned (sponsors or whatever). Do leave some pictures of the boat and whatever else you would like. 

Louis: I’ve gotta thank all of my friends and family, and especially my mom and dad, for the immense amount of support through my entire journey in fishing. The way that they’ve supported and pushed me through the years has helped me out more than any dollar, boat, truck, or graph ever could, and I cannot thank both of them enough for it. The entire Charlotte team has had our backs this entire year, and they might be a bunch of idiots but you’d be hard-pressed to find a more genuine, good group of people in this industry. Lastly I’ve gotta mention all of the guys at the Bizz Baits shop. Working with them for the past year and a half has been a truly amazing experience, and having them all behind us as some of our biggest fans has been awesome.

Michael: I have to thank my parents first off. When I told them that I was going to be doing this, they didn’t understand what it was all about, and were mad that I would be missing school, and spending all this money on “just fishing”. When they realized how much I loved to do it, they supported me every tournament and didn’t miss a single weigh in. I would also like to thank all my friends and all the boys on the Charlotte team, they backed us the whole way and were our biggest supporters. Last but not least I would like to thank Bizz Baits and True South Custom Lures. All the guys at the shop have supported us nonstop, and we ended up catching a lot of bass that we weighed in on their baits.