Local ice fishing team wins on Minnewaska

A local ice fishing team took top honors and was crowned the first ever Team Extreme National Champions at the Team Extreme National Ice Fishing tournament held on Lake Minnewaska last weekend.
The team of Clayton Kettering  (left) and John Shelton, both of Glenwood, won the national championship with a two-day total of 23.79 pounds of sunfish and crappies.  Team totals were determined by weighing the eight biggest sunfish and eight biggest crappies each day.
The national tournament brought the top 29 teams from the Team Extreme Ice Fishing Tournaments held throughout the winter in Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa. It was the best of the best that converged on Lake Minnewaska last weekend, and Kettering and Shelton won the national championship.
The top three teams in the national tournament were all from Minnesota.  “We (top three teams) even fished together most of the time,” Kettering said.  “We  fished mostly around the ‘crappie town’ and ‘bottle bay’ areas,” he added.
The team of Alex McStott and Shawn Lankki finished second in the tournament, with a two-day total of 22.97 pounds of fish.  The team of Drew Little and Joshua Sykora took third, with a two-day total weight of 21.13 pounds..

Why Minnewaska was chosen for the national championship.  “There are a lot of reasons why Team Extreme picked Lake Minnewaska for our National Championship,” said Tad Westermann, co-owner of Team Extreme.  “The quality of panfish that roam this body of water are second to none in the state.  The vast number of ‘spots’ a team could fish is endless and the geographical location is perfect,” he said.  “And the surrounding towns have everything a team could need, from lodging to hardware store and bait shops, with the best bait around at Keops Bait n Tackle.” Everything that can go wrong while ice fishing in a tournament seems to, so guys need to have a place to go to get their gear all fixed up,” Westermann explained.

While the national championship is moving to a Wisconsin lake next year, there will likely be Team Extreme tournament next year on Minnewaska.

The event brought in ice anglers from as far away as Poland and Chicago, and the competition was stiff. With the teams prefishing the lake before the weekend tournament, local hotels and restaurants were full much of the week.

Fish donated to needy families

Participating teams along with the Team Extreme Ice Fishing Tournament also donated fish from one day of fishing on Minnewaska to Pope County Families in Need.  “This was a big deal for Team Extreme,” Westerman said.  “Team Extreme staff cleaned fish for two hours on Saturday after the tournament! Team Extreme anglers were able to provide Pope County Families in Need with just shy of 148 pounds of fresh fish with about 248 fish cleaned!”

Tournament sponsors

“Without these sponsors none of the great things that Team Extreme Ice Fishing Tournaments are doing could be done!”