Date: Fri 23-Aug-1996

Publication: Bee

Author: KIMH

Quick Words:

Bryan-Kerchal-Hall

Full Text:

Hall of Fame - Bryan Kerchal

"My grandfather came out with an old steel fishing pole with an old

bait-casting reel and nylon line. I just pulled the line out and dropped it

down. He gave me some worms and I caught some fish."

- Bryan Kerchal, 1994

When Bryan Kerchal held his first fishing pole almost 18 years ago on the

shores of Taunton Lake, he didn't know a Gitzit or a ¬-ounce black jig or an

Uncle Josh No. 11A pork frog from a nightcrawler.

But he soon found out.

Kerchal spent the next 16 years figuring out fish . . . their likes and

dislikes, their habits and their habitats, and, most importantly, where they

liked to hide. Day after day spent at Taunton Lake with his friends or by

himself, Kerchal not only figured out fish but he figured out how to fish and

as each day went by the flame for his dream to become a professional fisherman

burned hotter and hotter.

In 1993, Kerchal finished first in the Eastern Region of the Wrangler/B.A.S.S.

National Championships in Pine Bluff, Arkansas, and became one of the only

fisherman to qualify for the B.A.S.S. Masters Classic as an amateur.

The finish - 41st out of 41 fishermen - did not discourage Kerchal, a short

order cook, at all. The $3,000 prize money might have helped a little. Still,

a year later he once again finished first in the Eastern Region of the

Wrangler/B.A.S.S. National Championships and once again qualified for the

B.A.S.S. Masters Classic in Greensboro, North Carolina.

Only this time, he won it.

Won it all - the only amateur to do it in 24 years.

The B.A.S.S. Masters Classic is the single biggest fishing tournament in the

world, attracting anglers from every corner of the globe - North America to

South America, Africa to Australia. The win not only provided Kerchal with

$50,000 in prize money, it also all but assured him of a life as a

professional fisherman - sponsorships . . . endorsements . . . lectures.

And fishing - tournament after tournament after tournament.

Life looked good.

But life was too short.

Just five months after winning the B.A.S.S. Masters Classic, Kerchal was

killed in the crash of American Eagle Flight 3379 near the Raleigh-Durham

International Airport in North Carolina.

He was on his way to Raleigh-Durham from Greensboro, N.C., where he had taken

part in an employee-appreciation day for one of his sponsors, Wrangler Jeans.

The commuter plane, finishing its fifth trip in a day-long hopscotch across

North Carolina, crashed in a fog and incessant drizzle, killing 15 of the 20

people aboard.

"All throughout our friendship," Kerchal's friend, Tom Cutler, said last

December, "he wanted to be a professional bass fisherman. We both wanted to,

but he took a route that nobody would take. He would take any risk that he had

to."

Cutler remembered, too, the last time he fished with his friend.

"He came down here and we spent three days fishing together," Cutler had said.

"He was so happy. It was just like we were fishing on Taunton again. He didn't

have an attitude or anything. It didn't go to his head. He was the same. He

hadn't changed. He was still Bryan."

The Dream

He didn't use a jig or a pork frog or a jelly belly or any of the myriad types

of lures that the professionals to catch his first fish. He used a worm - a

simple, slimy worm.

"My grandfather came out with an old steel fishing pole with an old

bait-casting reel and nylon line," Kerchal remembered. "I just pulled the line

out and dropped it down. He gave me some worms and I caught some fish."

And the dream began.

Kerchal got his first boat, which had a simple bait-casting set up so he could

fish using crank bait, when he was 14 years old. He was excited enough about

that that he had trouble, sometimes, making it to school. He found fishing on

Taunton Lake a lot more relaxing - and far more enjoyable - experience than

history or geometry or physics.

"That's when I really got into it," he said in 1994. "After I caught the first

one, I couldn't wait to go out the next day and get another."

He figured out the sport of angling fishing the local tournaments and with a

couple dozen of those every year, his skills got to the point where he was

able to qualify for the Wrangler/B.A.S.S. National Championships.

He finished 41st in a field of 41 fisherman from around the world, but he

learned a very valuable lesson.

"The biggest thing I learned from that tournament," he said, "is to go out and

do what you do instead of fishing the way the other guys fish. All the pros

said (in 1993) during pre-practice, you have to go out and fish deep, fish

ledges with crank baits if you're going to win. But that's not something I do.

I like to fish cover, like weeds and docks and trees. I could have done that

last year, but I never practiced it and did really bad. You have to stay with

what you do."

He stuck with that idea and that philosophy in 1994 and became the first

amateur in 24 years to win the B.A.S.S. Masters Classic.

"The weird thing is," Kerchal said just a few days later, "I had this feeling

I would win the night before the tournament began. I was extremely calm. When

you get that feeling before a tournament, it usually calculates into a near

win or a win because the key is staying calm."

His career as a professional fisherman may have been cut short by the tragedy

of American Eagle flight 3379, but at least for five months in 1994 Bryan

Kerchal was where he always wanted to be . . . on top of the fishing world.

And for what he achieved, Kerchal has become one of the founding members of

the Newtown Sports Hall of Fame.