College fishing is something I am obviously very passionate about still and really don’t think there will be a time when I am not. It is who I am today and there are thousands of collegiate anglers today who are just as passionate about the sport as I am. We caught up with Garrett Thompson of the WVU Fishing Team this week on the ‘The Catch‘ to get his background and his outlook on the 2023 season.
Garrett is a senior at West Virginia University majoring in digital marketing and has managed basically every position on the team from secretary to Vice President to President.
“I started fishing at an early age, probably around five years old. Anywhere there was water, I was trying to catch anything that swam,” Thompson said.
But it was in high school that Thompson found a new love for competitive fishing when he won the very first event he fished as a high schooler.
“I picked up bass fishing on my own in high school and started the bass team at Morgantown High School. I won my first ever B.A.S.S. high-school event on Stonewall Jackson that BASS Nation of West Virginia put on. After standing on that stage at the weigh-in and getting the trophies, I knew this was what I wanted to do.”
“I continued to feed my bass addiction, spending the majority of my free weekends on Lake Erie learning as much as I could about shallow largemouth and deep smallmouth.”
He would then later move onto the college ranks and join the West Virginia University Team when the likes of Nolan Minor and Casey Lanier were still on the team.
“My freshman year of college I met my good buddies Branden Newcome, Nolan Minor, and Casey Lanier. They pretty much took me under their wing and showed me the ropes on the tournament side and how to run the club.”
Thompson has done a fantastic job with the team and it has steadily grown throughout the years he has been there.
“I owe a lot to those guys for teaching me so much,” Thompson explained. “Ever since then I’ve fished every year and try to get as many new guys incorporated each year.”
As Thompson enters his final season as a collegiate angler, he is optimistic about his final run on the Bassmaster College Series with partner Ethan Perry.
“Ethan and I have had the same goals every year and that is to qualify for the Bassmaster College National Championship and obviously try to win every event we fish,” Thompson said. “With this being our last year I really want to shoot for the sky and give the Team of the Year a shot. I really do believe that we could be one of the most consistent teams if everything goes our way. If that doesn’t work out we still want to give ourselves a chance to make it to the College Classic Bracket through the National Championship.”
All things considered, Thompson has been to the Bassmaster National Championship a handful of times in his collegiate career. But one thing that sets him apart from a lot of other collegiate anglers is his creativity and motivation through his social media channels.
“I’ve always been into filming and sharing my fishing adventures, whether it was YouTube videos or photos, but as of recent the TikTok style form of content has been really popular,” said Thompson. “Since the YouTube fishing space is so saturated and repetitive, I decided to make an effort to post this short form of content daily.”
“Posting every day is a hard thing to do too, but I have fishing content saved to my phone from up to 5 years ago. My videos started getting views on Instagram reels and I eventually started making some money with the creator fund.”
And if you take a quick look back through his Instagram page @garrett_thompson_fishing he can prove that his videos have done tremendously well over time. Just recently he has had views in the hundreds of thousands.
“I never realized the value that this content had for my own brand and sponsors. This short video content has a crazy potential reach and is the future of social media content in my opinion.”
Thompson and partner Ethan Perry are entering their final season as a duo on the Bassmaster College Series in 2023 and they are looking to go out with a bang.
“I’m most looking forward to the Harris Chain of Lakes. We went there last year thinking that Florida was going to be our worst event and it would turn out to be our best tournament last season at 45th place,” Thompson said of his finish. “Last year we found so many areas that we could catch 20 to 30 fish per day, but they were all small males. I feel that those same areas would have been winning areas if the weather allowed those big females to move up. I think we left a lot on the table for that tournament and I believe we can get a step ahead of these fish come January.”
Thompson also mentioned if anyone has any questions related to the WVU Fishing Team feel free to reach DM the page on Instagram @wvufishingteam or email wvufishingteam@gmail.com
