Oklahoma angler Edwin Evers had a nice surprise during the opening minutes of Friday's second round of the Bassmaster Elite Series "Pride of Georgia" tournament.

"It was only my third cast this morning," the 33-year-old pro said. "I was pulling through some rocks and then I thought I was hung."

Then the "snag" began moving and Evers realized he had a whopper. The 6-pound, 7-ounce bass contributed to a two-day weight of 33 pounds, 14 ounces, placing him in the No. 1 spot for today's third round.

"Without that fish, I just had a mediocre stringer," he said. "I was covering a ton of water, though, fishing a zillion different spots."

Evers was barely ahead of another Oklahoman -- Kenyon Hill -- whose second-round limit weighing 14 pounds, 13 ounces, pushed his cumulative weight to 31 pounds, 13 ounces.

"I was trying to keep it as simple as possible, not trying a whole bunch of different things," he said. "It was basic, meat-and-potatoes fishing. Tomorrow I'm going to simplify even more."

The leader from Thursday's first-round, Denny Brauer of Missouri, was in third place, adding 9 pounds, 12 ounces to his 22-pound bag on Thursday for a third-place total of 31 pounds, 12 ounces.

"I had the same amount of bites," he said. "I just didn't get any big bites."

California fire captain Greg Gutierrez, whose 16-pound, 10-ounce weigh-in pushed his two-day total to 31 pounds, 2 ounces, is in fourth place.

"It was just one of those days," he said. "It was amazing. Everywhere we went, there were fish."

Today, he predicted, a lot more post-spawn bass will be boated.

After Friday's round, the original field of 109 anglers and 109 co-anglers was cut to the top 50 in each class. Today's round, which begins with a 6:30 a.m. launch, will determine the winner of the $25,000 top co-angler prize and also narrow the pro field down to the elite 12 finalists for Sunday's finish. The winning pro on Sunday receives $100,000.

Weigh-ins begin at 3 p.m. each day.

Today's action at Columbia County's Wildwood Park also marks the opening of the fishing expo, with demonstrations, exhibits, musical and other events. Also today, fans can also talk to the Elite pros during "Ask the Experts" at Bassmaster University presented by Comcast, set for 2:30 p.m. at the tournament site.