The Oregon State University team of Zach MacDonald, of Willits, Calif. and William Sparks, of Corvallis, Ore. won the National Guard FLW College Fishing West Conference event on Lake Shasta Saturday with five bass weighing 9 pounds, 4 ounces. The victory earned the team $5,000.The win also helped them advance to the West Conference Regional Championship.

"We battled the wind all day today," said Sparks, a marine biology major. "We shot all over the place, every little nook we could find. The fishing was slow, and very tough. We were fishing really shallow today. We were marking a whole bunch of fish, but we just couldn't get them to bite. The fish that we did get were up in about 15 feet.

"We caught two fish right away," Sparks continued. "One with a drop-shot rig and one on a pumpkin football jig. Then it really slowed down for us. Our boat broke down and we had to use the trolling motor to come in a few minutes earlier than we would have liked to. But I guess it worked out for us."

"This morning we were able to find a little spot where it was calmer and we caught our first two, but after 30 minutes it just died," said MacDonald, a fisheries and wildlife major. "The wind was really a factor for most of the day and it threw us off some spots that we wanted to fish."

"Our motor broke down too," MacDonald went on to say. "We had to fish off of our trolling motor this afternoon, so we found a spot close to the marina. We were able to catch our last two fish back-to-back on our last casts of the day using green-pumpkin jigs. We're definitely looking forward to regionals."

Rounding out the top five teams and also advancing to the West Regional Championship are:

The top five teams from each tournament qualify for the regional championship where the first-place team will win a Ranger 177TR bass boat with a 90-horsepower Evinrude or Mercury outboard wrapped in school colors for their fishing club. The top five teams from each regional tournament advance to the national championship.

College Fishing is free to enter and FLW provides boats and drivers for each competing team along with travel allowances. All participants must be registered, full-time undergraduate students at a four-year college or university and members of a fishing club recognized by their college or university.

The next National Guard FLW College West Conference tournament is scheduled for Feb. 25 at Lake Havasu in Lake Havasu City, Ariz., and is hosted by the Lake Havasu City Convention & Visitors Bureau.

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