PARIS, Tenn. — Caige Bragg felt like he let a championship victory slip through his fingers last year at Clarks Hill.
This year, the 18-year-old redeemed himself by executing a flawless game plan during the 2026 Strike King Bassmaster High School Championship at Kentucky Lake presented by Bill Dance Signature Lakes that secured the trophy that eluded him 364 days earlier.
Bragg caught a three-day total weighing 38 pounds, 4 ounces to win the prestigious tournament, edging out the second-place team of Weston Rigsby and Hudson Logan of the A1 Anglers Fishing Team by 1-5 for his first B.A.S.S. victory.
“This is super special, especially because it is my senior year. I really didn’t think it was going to happen today,” Bragg said.
Along with a $5,000 scholarship, Bragg also won a Tracker Pro170 with a Mercury engine through the B.A.S.S. Nation Alliance program.
The win comes after Bragg finished third at the 2025 National Championship at Clarks Hill, a tournament he felt he could’ve won had he not lost two quality largemouth on the tournament’s first day.
Since then, Bragg’s boat captain and father Jade Bragg said his son has grown tremendously as an angler.
“When he sat down after the second one jumped off at the boat, he said, ‘Dad, those two fish just cost me this tournament,’” Jade said. “He told me this year, ‘I want that trophy so bad and I plan on getting it.’ I’m proud of him. Last year when the bite got slow, he would have started running and gunning. He would have panicked. This year he kept his head down and kept fishing.
“He showed a lot of maturity.”
Bragg spent all week fishing a 3-mile stretch of the Big Sandy River arm of Kentucky Lake where he found crappie stake beds, brushpiles and isolated stumps anywhere between 8 and 15 feet of water. By the end of practice, he had over 60 waypoints marked.
“I marked a bunch of them in practice and they were full of fish. The past few days there have been fewer and fewer so I had to run as many of them as I could,” he said. “All of the piles I caught them out of were along the channel either on top of the flat or next to the drop.
“There was a good amount of crappie and shad, especially early in the morning. It was hard to see (bass) on (Garmin) LiveScope early in the mornings.”
A Hideup Fullcast Coike rigged on a Ryugi Quad Hook with a Varivas Grenade Sinker produced the majority of his largemouth bites.
“I clip that weight on the eyelet of my hook and then pinch it down with pliers, so it just hangs up there,” he said.
A Deps Sakamata Shad on an ⅛-ounce jighead added a key cull as well.
Sunny, calm conditions helped Bragg get off to a quick start on Day 1. He caught two 5-pounders on his way to landing a 14-6 limit that claimed the lead. As clouds entered the area, the bite slowed, but he managed to land a limit weighing 12-11 to maintain the top spot heading into the final day.
When he arrived at his starting area on Championship Saturday, Bragg noticed a lot of the bass had vacated the stake beds and brushpiles, but still managed to start the morning with an almost 5-pounder.
“It was a struggle today. It was slow. A lot of fish had definitely made their way out,” he explained. “I had a lot more smaller ones today.”
After that, he filled his limit with 2 1/2-pounders before culling them out with 3-pounders around 12:30.
In their first trip to the High School Championship, Rigsby and Logan finished second with 36-15 consisting mostly of largemouth. The rising Powdersville High School sophomores opened the tournament in third with 13-5 before adding 11-9 on Day 2 to stay inside the cutline. While they only caught two bass on the final day, they did land an 8-2 largemouth that earned them Big Bass of the Tournament honors and anchored their 12-1 bag.
“I’m speechless,” Rigsby said. “It feels amazing. We made the best of it. We put in a lot of hard work and I’m really proud of how we performed.”
Knowing the famed ledges would and already received a ton of pressure, Rigsby and Logan looked for brushpiles on subtle points along the main lake in 11 to 13 feet of water. Their most productive stretch was only 4 miles away from takeoff at Paris Landing.
“We had the understanding that this late in the year, the schools on the ledges are pretty busted up,” Logan said. “We really looked for where a flatter main lake bank met a deeper channel and created a point. We used our LiveScope to fish these subtle points that hit the main lake current with brushpiles.”
A Zoom Magnum Ol’ Monster was their primary bait. They rigged it two different ways: Texas-style with a 1/4-ounce sinker and a 4/0 hook and on a 3/4-ounce Carolina rig with a 5/0 hook.
When the sun was out, the bass setup how Rigsby and Logan needed. To start Day 3, clouds and rains prevailed, and the duo struggled to generate keeper bites. Around noon, however, the sun came out and they caught an almost 4-pounder and then the 8-pounder.
“I thought he was hung up,” Rigsby said. “When I got it in the net we were all speechless looking at it. It was a cool sight to see, especially on Championship Saturday.”
Unfortunately, time ran out before they could catch another keeper.
The Bandys High School duo of Tyler Nelson and Sawyer Reynolds finished third with a total of 36-6. Opening the tournament with 10-2, Nelson and Reynolds landed the biggest bag of the tournament, a 15-4 limit before adding 11-0 to their tally on the final day.
A Queen Tackle Porcupine Ball 25 was their primary bait for the week.
Canyon Padgett and Levi Tomlinson finished fourth with 34-12 while Travis Meche and Chance Watson from Rayne County High School rounded out the Top 5 with 32-15. The Top 12 finishers earned scholarship money.
The Henry County Tourism Authority is hosting this event.