New Carlisle’s Chassereau Earns Victory in Co-Angler Division

LAKEVIEW, Ohio (Aug. 3, 2026) – Boater Michael Nesbitt of St. Paris, Ohio, caught a total of five bass weighing 14 pounds, 3 ounces, to win the MLF Phoenix Bass Fishing League (BFL) Presented by T-H Marine on Indian Lake . The tournament was the third of five events of the season for the BFL Buckeye Division. Nesbitt earned $10,440, including the lucrative $7,000 Phoenix MLF bonus, for his victory.

Nesbitt used his home-lake knowledge and familiarity with state and local conservation agencies to devise a plan for the tournament. Large-scale weed cutting at Indian Lake is managed using commercial aquatic weed harvesters to clear quantities of nuisance vegetation from public waterways, and Nesbitt used his experience to predict where big bass would be.

“I had a little spot right off the main lake with some isolated grass, and I told my co-angler, ‘We’re going to spend about 20 minutes there. That’s it. We’re either going to catch them or we’re not,’” Nesbitt said. “We pulled up there and my third cast I caught a 3½-pounder on a spinnerbait. I caught a 13-incher, and then about the 10th cast I caught another 3½-pounder. Then I caught another 3½-pounder within sight of where I caught the other ones. I had three big ones in the first 30 minutes. The boats were still launching from the takeoff ramp.”

Nesbitt targeted thin grass off the bank in 2½ feet of water in an area where he knew the weed cutter had not visited in some time.

“The weed cutter hadn’t been in that area for about two weeks, so the grass was starting to grow back,” Nesbitt said. “I had some other big fish located in another area, but the weed cutter had been in there Wednesday and trashed it. There were a lot of people on those fish there, but the weed cutter got them.”

Nesbitt relocated and started running pad flats and matted grass with a frog and said he caught about 10 fish with the frog, but only one helped cull.

Nesbitt said he knew he had a good chance of winning the tournament when he caught his first 3½-pounder.

“Those fish are hard to come by up there,” Nesbit said. “Usually when you get one there are more right there. There are groups of those big ones that roam the lake. They’re hard to get. But if you land on them, you can get wealthy quick. And when I caught that second one, I told my co-angler, ‘The boys better catch them today, because I’m going to put the hammer down.’ And by the time I caught the third one I had a limit – in 30 minutes.

“I’ve spent a lot of time on that lake,” Nesbitt went on to say. “I’m self-employed, and my son and a couple of other guys work for me, and I ditched them the last two weeks. They were on their own pretty much every other day. I spent a lot of time on the water in the early morning before daylight trying to find that magic spot. That being said, I only caught one fish in practice where I caught the fish during the tournament. I caught a 4½-pounder there Wednesday.”

Nesbitt said he drilled a hole in the lip of the bass of the Indian Lake BFL trophy and hooked his tournament-winning spinnerbait in it to retire it.

“That’s where that spinnerbait is going to stay,” Nesbitt said. “My dad made that spinnerbait. And it was done after I caught that last big one. It was destroyed.”

The top 10 boaters finished the tournament:

1st:        Michael Nesbitt, St. Paris, Ohio, five bass, 14-3, $10,440 (includes $7,000 Phoenix bonus)
2nd:      Jake Poffenberger, Brookville, Ohio, five bass, 12-6, $1,680
3rd:       Logan Kaplon, Rural Valley, Penn., five bass, 11-7, $850
4th:       Kyle Weisenburger, Columbus Grove, Ohio, five bass, 10-4, $680
5th:       William Kronander, Brownsville, Penn., five bass, 10-2, $600
6th:       Chris Martinkovic, Hamilton, Ohio, five bass, 10-1, $670
7th:       Jason Koller, Oregonia, Ohio, five bass, 10-0, $500
8th:       Pete Justice, Sharonville, Ohio, five bass, 9-7, $470
8th:       Bob Logan, Waynesfield, Ohio, five bass, 9-7, $470
10th:     Dominic Bogolo, Hamilton, Ohio, five bass, 9-6, $630

Complete results can be found at MajorLeagueFishing.com.

Dominic Bogolo of Hamilton, Ohio, earned the Berkley Big Bass Boater award after landing a 4-pound, 3-ounce bass worth $200.

Jeremy Chassereau of New Carlisle, Ohio, won the co-angler division and the top prize of $1,770 Saturday after bringing three bass to the scale that totaled 9 pounds, 8 ounces.

The top 10 co-anglers finished:

1st:        Jeremy Chassereau, New Carlisle, Ohio, three bass, 9-8, $1,770
2nd:      Douglas Shope, Arcanum, Ohio, three bass, 6-12, $840
3rd:       David Prater, Franklin, Ohio, three bass, 6-5, $425
4th:       Larry Spivey, Middletown, Ohio, three bass, 5-14, $340
5th:       Eric Moore, Okeana, Ohio, three bass, 5-9, $300
6th:       Dylan Phillips, Albany, Ohio, three bass, 5-8, $260
7th:       Joshua Guthrie, Athens, Ohio, three bass, 5-3, $250
8th:       Matt Gorham, Barberton, Ohio, three bass, 5-2, $240
9th:       Austin Herbst, Hamilton, Ohio, three bass, 4-14, $230
10th:     Brian Bogard, Valparaiso, Ind., three bass, 4-11, $232
10th:     Cameron Davidson, Monroeville, Penn., two bass, 4-11, $182

Chassereau also earned the Berkley Big Bass co-angler award after landing a 4-pound, 1-ounce bass worth $100.

After three events, Bob Logan of Waynesfield, Ohio, now leads the 7 Brew Buckeye Division Angler of the Year (AOY) race with 731 points, while Austin Herbst of Hamilton, Ohio, leads the Buckeye Division Co-Angler of the Year race with 723 points.

The top 45 boaters and co-anglers in the division based on point standings, along with the five tournament winners of each qualifying event, will qualify for the Oct. 8-10 BFL Regional tournament on the Potomac River in Marbury, Maryland. Boaters will fish for a top award of a new Phoenix 819 Pro with a 200-horsepower Mercury or Suzuki outboard worth $50,000, while co-anglers will compete for a top prize of a new Phoenix 518 pro with a 115-horsepower Mercury or Suzuki outboard, worth $33,500.

The 2026 Phoenix BFL Presented by T-H Marine is a 24-division circuit devoted to weekend anglers, with 128 events throughout the season, five qualifying tournaments in each division. The top 45 boaters and co-anglers from each division, along with the five qualifying tournament winners, will advance to one of six BFL Regional tournaments where they are competing to finish in the top seven, which then qualifies them for one of the longest-running championships in all of competitive bass fishing – the BFL All-American. The 2027 BFL All-American will take place June 5-7, at the Kissimmee Chain of Lakes in Kissimmee, Florida, and is hosted by Experience Kissimmee.

Proud sponsors of the 2026 MLF Phoenix Bass Fishing League Presented by T-H Marine include: 7 Brew, Abu Garcia, Athletic Brewing, B&W Trailer Hitches, Berkley, Black Buffalo, BUBBA, Cigars International, Epic Baits, Grizzly, Mercury, MillerTech, Mystik Lubricants, OFF! Deep Woods, Onyx, O’Reilly Auto Parts, Phoenix Boats, PiranhO2, Power-Pole, Precision Sonar, Suzuki Marine, Tackle Warehouse, T-H Marine, Toyota, VOSKER, YETI and Yuengling.

For complete details and updated tournament information, visit MajorLeagueFishing.com. For regular BFL updates, photos, tournament news and more, follow MLF5’s social media outlets at Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.

About Major League Fishing
Major League Fishing (MLF) is the world’s largest tournament-fishing organization, producing more than 250 events annually at some of the most prestigious fisheries in the world, while broadcasting to America’s living rooms on CBS, Discovery, Outdoor Channel, VICE, World Fishing Network, RFD-TV, Game & Fish TV and Rumble, and on demand on MyOutdoorTV (MOTV). Headquartered in Benton, Kentucky, the MLF roster of bass anglers includes the world’s top pros and more than 30,000 competitors in all 50 states and 20 countries. Since its founding in 2011, MLF has advanced the sport of competitive fishing through its premier television broadcasts and livestreams and is dedicated to improving the quality of life for bass through research, education, fisheries enhancement and fish care.