The SKA National Championship is coming to Beautiful Biloxi!
This is an article from the local Biloxi Newspaper, the Sun Herald.
Ska Nationals Biloxi
It’s the third week of November and the Southern Kingfish Association has landed in Biloxi.
That means it is national championship time as more than 240 teams from across the southeast compete for the elusive title of being the best king mackerel angler.
To reach the finals, teams from Texas, Mississippi, Alabama, Florida, South Carolina, North Carolina and Georgia competed in a series of tournaments to qualify for the national championship.
Now, the teams will put their skills to test in a two-day format consisting of one fish per day with the winner being declared based on a two-fish aggregate weight.
“Fishing has been superb all summer long on the east side of the (Mississippi) river,’’ SKA founder Jack Holmes said. “I expect the same thing this weekend.
“Preliminary fishing has already been good. The fishermen have been catching wahoo in the 70-pound range, a lot of tuna and one boat tagged and released a blue marlin. I think we are in for one of the best tournaments we’ve had.’’
Based on the early fishing success, Holmes has added a $1,000 pot for the largest wahoo entered.
“We will pay ($1,000) for the largest wahoo weighed,’’ Holmes said. “We have always had good turnouts at the scales and this gives the crowd another species to go with king mackerel.’’
The 2008 championship saw Randall Edens and the East Coast Sports Team out of North Carolina win the Class of 23 championship while Ed and Shaun Mecchella of St. Simons Island, Ga., won the Open Class title.
That event featured six-to-eight foot waves with a morning temperature of 29 degrees on the opening day.
This time around, the marine forecast calls for 10-to-15 knot east winds and waves running two-to-four feet and a forecasted high temperature of 71.
“We had a 57 (-pound king) last year,’’ Holmes said. “And we had real bad weather. I think we will see some 50s this year and we might see a 60.
“I expect to see some good fish.’’ Click here to read the rest of this article….
