GUNTERSVILLE, Ala. — Nathan Reynolds has spent more hours than he can count on Lake Guntersville over the years. It was he and his father’s favorite destination as he was growing up, so much so that the Reynolds family now owns property near the lake.
The legendary waters the Nashville native loves so much provided yet another monumental moment in his life on Friday. Reynolds won the 2026 Nitro Boats Bassmaster Elite Qualifier at Lake Guntersville presented by Bass Pro Shops with a three-day total weighing 58 pounds, 10 ounces, not only earning the trophy and a $65,000 check, but also a trip to the 2027 Bass Pro Shops Bassmaster Classic presented by Under Armour at Lake Hartwell.
Making the moment sweeter, the 22-year-old finished second in Nitro Boats Bassmaster Elite Qualifiers presented by Bass Pro Shops points and secured his spot in the 2027 Progressive Bassmaster Elite Series, joining one of his best friends and University of North Alabama teammate Dylan Nutt in the rookie class.
“It is overwhelming,” Reynolds said. “There are so many great anglers that spend 10, 20 years trying to accomplish one of these things, and I did it all in one weekend. I’m so honored to hold this candle, if you will. Anyone one of these guys deserves it just as much as I do.”
A 2022 Bassmaster High School All-American and current University of North Alabama student-angler set to graduate in December, Reynolds was the most consistent angler of the week. He opened the tournament in eighth with a limit weighing 19-6 before jumping into fourth on Day 2 with 19-9 and rounding out the event with 19-11.
Post-front conditions fully set in on Guntersville during Championship Friday. A cold wind blew from the northwest, and temperatures barely reached 50 degrees in the afternoon hours. No angler reached the 20-pound mark on the final day while Reynolds and Wisconsin’s Brian Post were the only two to eclipse 19 pounds.
When Reynolds saw Lake Guntersville on the schedule, he believed throwing a topwater would be the best way to catch quality bass during this event. But as the tournament approached and cold fronts began to move through, a new idea emerged.
“I love to throw a trap, and when I saw this cold snap coming, I was convinced mid-depth hydrilla and eelgrass mix was going to be the deal,” he explained. “I love doing it this time of year when it gets cold and I stuck with it. And here we are.”
Reynolds targeted several different stretches of short eelgrass with taller clumps of hydrilla mixed in. To find those, he used the time before off limits to scout where the grass was setting up using his eyes and his side and down scan imaging. During practice, Reynolds averaged only 16 pounds a day, but as the temperature dropped during the week, the bigger bass started moving to those areas.
“I thought it might happen, but how many times do things go your way like that?” Reynolds remarked.
During the tournament, two of those stretches produced the best quality. While other competitors stayed out on the shallower river bars, Reynolds targeted grass in 6 to 8 feet of water. To get bit, he needed baitfish to be present.
A 5/8-ounce Yo-Zuri Rattlin’ Vibe in the matte ghost smelt color was his best producing bait. In mostly cloudy conditions, Reynolds would switch to a citrus shad color. He tossed that lipless crankbait on a 7-foot-3 medium-heavy Daiwa Multi-Purpose rod paired with a Daiwa Tatula Elite baitcaster spooled with 15-pound fluorocarbon.
At the beginning of the tournament, Reynolds would utilize a steady retrieve that allowed him to tick the top of the grass clumps. As it got colder, the bass seemed to bury themselves in the grass, and he would have to rip his bait out of the clumps to generate bites.
“They were inhaling it at the beginning of the week,” Reynolds said. “(Day 3), with the cold snap, I noticed they wanted to be buried in the grass, and I had to rip my bait out of the grass. I would either come out with grass or come out with a bass. That is typical for a cold front like this.”
After a slower morning than expected, Reynolds made a move to one of his key stretches and caught 13 pounds quickly. Not long after filling out the initial limit, he landed a 4 1/2-pounder and then a 5-9 to reach his 19-11 total.
“It’s like it was meant to be,” he said.
Willie McMullen grabbed second place with a total of 56-10, his second Top 10 of the season. The Georgia native opened the tournament with a solid limit weighing 17-5 but jumped into the Top 10 on Day 2 by blasting 21-3, the largest limit of the day. He wrapped up the event with 18-2.
“When I first got here, I tried fishing docks because the grass was pretty intimidating. I got some bites doing that but nothing with any size,” McMullen said. “The third day of practice, I found some bass in some lily pads but couldn’t get them to bite. I tried some docks in a backwater slough close by, but they were too shallow, and on the way out I saw this mat. I caught two 4-pounders there.”
That one grass mat, hydrilla with a mix of duckweed, on the northern end of Guntersville produced all 15 of his keeper bites. The wind changed how thick the mat was and where the bass set up in that mat each day.
“When I first pulled up, I could hear the bream sucking under the mat. That was key. There were also a lot of gizzards (shad) too,” he explained. “Every day, I went all the way around it. They were on the windy side of it today, except for my big one.”
To get through the mat the first day, McMullen punched a Reaction Innovations Sweet Beaver in the hematoma color on an 1 1/2-ounce weight with a 4/0 flipping hook. When the wind started to blow, he switched to a 2-ounce weight and a midsize Zoom Z-Craw in tilapia.
Dillon Falardeau fell just short of qualifying for his second-straight Bassmaster Classic, finishing third with a total of 56-8. Opening the tournament with 20-2, the Chickamauga Lake guide added 21-5 on Day 2 before landing just 15-1 on the final day.
“I had a couple of big chances today, and none of them got it,” the Rhode Island native said. “They didn’t come back for it. It’s just part of it.”
On Day 1, Falardeau opened the morning throwing a frog around matted vegetation before moving out to a 2-mile stretch of main river bar. There, he threw a blue gizzard-colored Strike King KVD Mega Dawg on 65-pound braid over patches of hydrilla, milfoil and eelgrass. The rest of the tournament, his best frogging stretch was unfishable, and the main river bar became his primary area.
“The more I threw that big topwater, the more I learned about it,” Falardeau said. “When I got to a clump, I would slow it down over the clump and then sped it up when it reached the edge, so it looked like it was running away from the clump.”
Post anchored his 19-2 Day 3 limit with a 7-8 largemouth, earning the $500 bonus for Phoenix Boats Big Bass of the Tournament.
Louisiana’s Brennan Flick earned Elite Qualifier Angler of the Year, amassing 347 points during the three-tournament sprint to earn the $45,000 bonus and a spot in the Elite Series. The nine anglers joining him are Reynolds (331 points); Alabama’s Brody Robison (330 points); Connecticut’s Noah Winslow (328 points); North Carolina’s Kaden Buchmann (316 points); Missouri’s Trey Schroeder (308 points); South Carolina’s Cody Abbott (299 points); Florida’s Bryson Osteen (296 points); Kentucky’s Bailey Gay (294 points); and Alabama’s Lucas Lindsay (287 points).
Marshall County Tourism and Sports hosted the tournament.