MASSENA, N.Y. – After kicking off his 2025 campaign in late January with a win at the Sam Rayburn Southwestern Toyota Series, Brody Campbell added another triumph to his résumé, thanks to a 26-pound bag of smallmouth on the final day of the st. Lawrence River Northern Toyota Series.
The Oxford, Ohio, pro finished the three-day event with 79-1 to outdistance Alex Korol (78-1) and Erik Luzak (74-11) and earn a $72,402 paycheck, including a $35,000 Phoenix MLF Bonus. He also moved into the lead in the division’s Fishing Clash Angler of the Year race.
Campbell’s win came three weeks to the day after a disappointing 47th-place finish in the final Tackle Warehouse Invitationals tournament of the year – also on the St. Lawrence – cost him an invitation to the 2026 Bass Pro Tour by 1 point.
“This place is special, but I was really mad at ‘em this week,” Campbell joked as he accepted the trophy. “I went out there every day, daylight ‘til dark, and tried to learn as much about this fishery as possible. I think I learned some key new areas and put all of that time and energy to work this week.”
Korol made a fierce run at Campbell with 25-15, 25-10 and 26-8, competing in his first-ever Toyota Series tournament. Luzak, who electrified the Day 2 weigh-in with an MLF-record 31-5, earned his first MLF Top 10 and big-fish honors with a 7-14.
Campbell has invested a hearty portion of his past two summers fishing the St. Lawrence every day from sunup to sundown, and it paid off handsomely this week – he was the model of consistency on the big river, weighing in 26-2 on Day 1 and 26-15 on Day 2 to set the stage for his 26-0 winning bag on Saturday, all on spots that he’s identified recently.
He landed on a school of big smallmouth early on Day 1, loading up nearly 27 pounds in 45 minutes with a Deps Sakamata Shad on a 1/4-ounce jighead and a Megabass Hazedong Shad on a 3/8-ounce drop-shot. For the drop-shot, he used a 7-foot, 2-inch medium-action Bird Dog spinning rod.
He returned to the same spot to start Day 2 and found “almost nothing” (one bite) before hopping to a handful of other places, eventually settling onto a choice spot where he dragged a drop-shot and loaded up another 26-pound bag.
“I had a couple of key places that I ended up bouncing around on Day 2,” Campbell said. “Knowing other places to go that day was a key for me. I started running new stuff after that first spot didn’t pan out, found a subtle little vein of rock and caught 26 again. I couldn’t see any of those fish – I just knew that’s where they should be.”
He entered the final morning with a 4-4 deficit to make up on Luzak, but the Canadian pro couldn’t match his big-fish mojo from the previous two days, faltering Saturday with 17-6 and opening the door for a Campbell comeback. Campbell repeated his pattern on the final day, moving around between a handful of spots with the drop-shot, eventually “scrounging up” another 26-pound bag to claim the win.
“Spending as much time here as I have and just knowing where big fish are was big for me this week,” Campbell said. “I didn’t waste my time on anything I didn’t think had big fish, I knew that, if I was catching fish on those spots, they were going to be big. Going all-in like that can work out really good or really bad – it turned out to be good this week.”
This is how the top 10 finished up:
1. Brody Campbell: 79-1
2. Alex Korol: 78-1
3. Erik Luzak: 74-11
4. Tommy Dickerson: 73-00
5. Logan Dyer: 71-5
6. Jeremy Gordon: 70-00
7. Dante Piraino: 69-15
8. Hayden O’Barr: 69-10
9. Lee Stephens: 69-5
10. Spike Stoker: 69-3
