A hot twilight bite at the Texas Billfish Open presented by No Rivals contributes to wild swings on the leaderboard and the division\u2019s first grand slam of the 2026 season.<\/p>\n
It was a rough ride offshore for Friday morning\u2019s shotgun start, forcing teams to endure a longer run than anticipated. Despite the challenging conditions, the action eventually heated up once lines went into the water, which was expected after a month of plentiful billfish action in other tournaments utilizing the same boundary.<\/p>\n
The Third Coast Renegades struck first when Drake Beasley released a sailfish at 2:10 PM, giving one of the home-state clubs the tournament’s opening points. Less than 20 minutes later, the Louisiana Canyons answered as Jaselyn Berthelot released her eighth sailfish of the season to move into second place.<\/p>\n
The Renegades weren’t finished. Kevan Billings added another sailfish just before 4:00 PM, putting the Texas club atop the standings with 150 points after the opening scoring window.<\/p>\n
The West Florida Black Flags came alive when Donnie McMahon released the tournament’s first white marlin, before he and wife Rose McMahon combined for a double sailfish release that vaulted the Black Flags into first place with 250 points. The Renegades stayed within striking distance, however, as Kevan Billings added another sailfish just moments later to keep the margin at only 25 points.<\/p>\n
The Gulf Coast Cowboys got on the board thanks to Brian Kelley, who released a white marlin to move into third place.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The defending SFC league champions, the Texas Lone Stars, announced themselves when they released the tournament’s first blue marlin. Worth 450 points, the catch from angler Bryan Richter, a Port Aransas local,\u00a0 immediately catapulted the Lone Stars from last on the leaderboard to first place.<\/p>\n
The Black Flags added another sailfish via Marty Wilson, while the Renegades responded almost immediately with a white marlin from Dax Wright, putting themselves just one blue marlin away from the grand slam bonus. Moments later, another Renegades sailfish moved them back into second place, only 50 points behind the Lone Stars.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the Mississippi Blues got on the board late with a white marlin released by Garett Schluter, leaving every club with points after the opening day.<\/p>\n
The Lone Stars appeared to seize control when Bryan Richter released a second blue marlin, doubling their total to 900 points and giving the hometown club a commanding advantage.<\/p>\n
But Donnie McMahon had the final answer on day one.<\/p>\n
Just 13 minutes later, McMahon released a blue marlin to complete the Gulf Division’s first Grand Slam of the season. Combined with the 200-point Grand Slam bonus, the catch was worth a massive 650 points, launching the West Florida Black Flags back into first place with 975 points, just 75 ahead of the Texas Lone Stars entering Day 2.<\/p>\n
Day 1 Standings<\/p>\n
West Florida Black Flags \u2013 975 Points<\/p>\n
Texas Lone Stars \u2013 900 Points<\/p>\n
Third Coast Renegades \u2013 400 Points<\/p>\n
Gulf Coast Cowboys \u2013 100 Points<\/p>\n
Mississippi Blues \u2013 100 Points<\/p>\n
Louisiana Canyons \u2013 75 Points<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A hot twilight bite at the Texas Billfish Open presented by No Rivals contributes to wild swings on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":407314,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[27,29,28],"class_list":["post-407313","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-texas","tag-texas","tag-texas-headlines","tag-texas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407313","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407313"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407313\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/407314"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407313"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407313"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407313"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}