The George Rogers Clark High School fishing team is headed to nationals.

The team went to Guntersville, Alabama for the national qualifier last weekend and had to finish in the top seven to qualify for nationals.

They will be returning to Alabama to fish on Pickwick Lake.

Boat captain Shane Dunaway said the team is excited to compete again.

“The boys are super excited,” he said. “We pre-fished the Friday before the tournament and it didn’t go so well. The wind was blowing hard, it was rainy and we didn’t catch a single fish all day.”

Dunaway said the team stayed motivated to compete Saturday by creating a backup plan.

“We got done and went back to the room,” he said. “The boys looked at the map and the water that was on it. They did their research. We basically decided to go somewhere different and test our luck and it worked out in our favor.”

Junior Alex Dunaway is thrilled to be making his second trip to Alabama.

“I’m going to be pretty excited,” he said. “We fished last year in the World Finals. It was a different experience so it’ll be cool to fish on the other side of the tournament that we didn’t get to fish at last year.”

Alex Dunaway said patience is a virtue to be successful in fishing.

“You definitely have to work hard,” he said. “There’s an unlimited amount of hours you have to put in for this. You have to always be willing to learn, be patient and willing to put the time in.”

Sophomore Allen Powe has different ideas in mind.

“I’m pretty pumped,” he said. “This will be my second time going so hopefully I can get some revenge on the lake.”

Powe has only competitively fished for two years, but said he couldn’t imagine his life without it.

“This is my sophomore year,” he said. “Leading up to this, I’ve spent two years getting serious about fishing. I’ve been bass fishing since I started walking. I love to do it. The water is a place I can go to when I’m stressed out and I can fish with friends and have fun.”

The team will have several more tournaments from now until nationals in June.

They will be fishing in the BASS series, FLW series as well as other open tournaments.

The high school region tournament will be hosted in April at Cave Run Lake just outside of Morehead.

If the team qualifies, they will be headed to the KHSAA state tournament.