>>read more Mercury Trail stories<<

BEAUFORT, NC - The members of Morehead City-based Jackpot crew couldn’t have come up with a more appropriate name for their fishing team regarding this year’s Gregory Poole Strike It Rich King Mackerel Tournament. After catching the 37.75 pound king that earned them the guaranteed $50,000 first place prize money in the event, held August 24-25 on the Beaufort Waterfront, the anglers can truly say they’ve hit the Jackpot.

The crew is no stranger to large tournament prize checks, having won nearly $50,000 in the Atlantic Beach King Mackerel Tournament several years ago in addition to many other high finishes. The team’s usual boat, a 35' Yamaha-powered Wellcraft, was off fishing another tournament, so Jackpot crew members Johnny Hudson and Robert Parrott fished the Strike It Rich aboard Hudson’s 23' Contender powered by twin 140 Suzuki Four Strokes.

The crew caught bait easily on the Saturday of the event near Harkers Island. “We pulled up to Harkers with about six boats already there, one pogy flipped five feet in front of the boat, and I dropped the net on it and caught 60 of them,” Hudson said.

With bait covered, the Jackpot anglers, along with most of the boats in the tournament, headed for the east side of Lookout Shoals, an area that has produced the top fish in the past several Crystal Coast KMT’s.

Ignoring the crowds who chose to fish the east side hotspots at 30 Minute Rock, 1700 Rock, and the Atlas Tanker, Parrott and Hudson headed a bit further offshore to Chicken Rock, 16 miles off the beach in around 120 feet of water.

As the only boat targeting kings in the area, the pair felt their chances were good but, at first, all they hooked were amberjacks. “There were two boats grouper fishing out there,” Hudson revealed. “We saw one of them anchored up, and were headed towards him when we both saw a big king sky eight feet into the air. We headed right at it, and the grouper boat called us on the radio and asked: ‘Are y’all king fishing? Did you see that fish?’ Right when we came over where he skied, right then, he hit it.”

The fish fell for a naked ribbonfish 35 feet deep on the downrigger at 9:30 Saturday morning, and Parrott grabbed the rod after the release clip popped. “He came across the back of the boat, and then ran off a couple hundred yards,” Hudson recalled.

With Parrott on the rod, Hudson took the Contender’s helm, and the crew chased their king down. The king made two more solid runs before it seemed things were under control. “After that, he came back to the boat,” said Hudson. When the fish returned, Hudson was ready with the gaff, and sank it home 20 minutes after the king bit. With a near 40 pound fish in the boat, Hudson and Parrott continued fishing around Chicken Rock, hoping for another big fish. However, according to Hudson, “At that point, it was mostly just a matter of killing time until the weigh-in started.”

The Jackpot anglers used up the hours by continuing to troll around Chicken Rock for most of the morning, and then headed to Drum Inlet, fished for a while, and finished their day trolling the Beaufort Inlet shipping channel. The 37.75 pound winning fish was their only king mackerel of the day, although they had plenty of action with amberjacks while fishing Chicken Rock.

Despite only killing time while waiting for the weigh-in, the Jackpot anglers were far from the first boat in line at the scales. When they weighed the 37.75 pound mackerel, it bumped the 37.50 pound fished already weighed in by Skip Conklin’s Ocean Athlete team to second place. “Skip did the exact same thing to us in the 2001 CCSA tournament,” Hudson said, “so I don’t feel too bad about doing it to him.”

This was the first year the Jackpot crew fished the Gregory Poole tournament, but it won’t be the last, Hudson assured. “When we were walking out of the captain’s meeting, we looked at each other and said, ‘This is one of the best run tournaments we’ve ever seen, we’re going to fish it every year.’ That was before we even caught the winning king, so you know we’ve got to come back now.”

Hudson wished to thank Calcutta, the Jackpot crew’s primary sponsor, for their contributions to the team’s success.