Monroe, who's now en route to next week's Potomac AFS, is stoked to have a shot at the AOY title.

"I'm happy with the finish," he said. "I gained some points on Bryan Thrift. Brent got a few points on me, but it makes the race a little closer and anything's possible. Plus, I pretty much guaranteed myself a spot in the Cup – I'm 99.9% locked in with a shot at AOY. If I can crack a Top 10 at Guntersville and Bryan's a Top 40, it's going to be close."

About his light bag today (9-04), Monroe said: "I never saw them today. They dropped the water a foot last night and it scattered those fish horribly. I came up on one little wolfpack of fish and they weren't even that big.

"I tried a few little other things – I went and flipped for a little bit, and I went back to a swimbait and tried a smaller swimbait to see if it could fire some fish up. It didn't. Then I just hammered it out with a topwater. I had nine keeper bites and landed five." Complete Story