Mighty oaks from little acorns grow.

About a year ago, Franklin College vice president for enrollment and marketing Andrew Hendricks sat down for lunch with 1999 Franklin graduate JT Volz to discuss the idea of starting a competitive bass fishing program.

As the Grizzlies prepare for their first-ever intercollegiate competition — the Big Bass Classic, which will be held on Kentucky Lake in Tennessee Saturday and Sunday — those involved in planting the seeds can't help but marvel at how far things have come since that initial conversation.

Though Franklin did field a bass fishing team in the spring of 2025 under Volz, nobody on that squad had ever fished competitively before. They entered some events in Indiana to gain some experience, but those weren't full-fledged college tournaments. Still, they at least provided a much-needed taste.

"None of my guys had any fishing experience," Volz said. "They know how to fish ponds and creeks and things like that, but just to be able to compete for seven or eight hours straight, and dealing with the grind of not catching something ... just to realize how hard it was to fish like that competitively."

This weekend's trip feels like more of a true beginning. The one holdover from those toe-in-the-water competitions last spring — senior Logan Oppy — joins freshman Carson Volz (JT's son) on Kentucky Lake this week.

Though in his first semester of college, Carson Volz brings an impressive fishing résumé to the table. He was a key member of an Indian Creek fishing team that won four straight Indiana state championships, and he was named Bass Nation's Angler of the Year for Indiana earlier this year.

After going out on the water with Oppy a couple of times this summer, Carson Volz is excited about this maiden voyage, which he says will be a level up from the high school competitions he's been in the last four years.

"It's better competition than high school," he said. "This year's definitely going to be a learning experience, because a lot of these places I haven't been able to fish yet. So it's going to be a very new experience, and I'm really excited."

The Big Bass Bash is a two-day, big bass format event with a total of seven weigh-in sessions. Each session will pay out for the 10 biggest fish (except for the seventh and final weigh-in, which will reward the top 20). Though JT Volz and his son are tournament veterans, there will be an adjustment period as they adapt to the different rules for each competition this year.

Consistency is one big key to navigating those unknowns, Carson Volz says, but confidence in your abilities is an even bigger one.

"It's everything," he said. "You'll roll up on a spot, and there'll be nothing there, and it's your gut feeling that tells you to go there during the tournament — and in an hour's time, you can win a tournament just by trusting your gut. It's a confidence in what you're doing, what you're throwing, how you're throwing, what you're looking at; there's so much more that goes on than just driving, throwing it out there and reeling it in. You've got to think water color, depth, temperature, if there's current, what these fish are doing. There's a lot more that goes on than just, 'There might be a fish there.'"

That confidence should be boosted by being able to look more like a big-time outfit. The program has the full weight of the college behind it — unlike teams at other schools across Indiana, the Grizzlies are an actual school team and not just a club. The Volzes' boat, the same one they used to win championships at Indian Creek, has a slick new wrap on it with the Franklin College colors and logos.

And their transportation — often a major expense for competitive fishing teams — is being taken care of. Bradley Hubler Chevrolet in Franklin, one of the Grizzlies' two early sponsors along with Pure Fishing, has offered the use of a pickup truck so that the team can haul their boat to and from tournaments.

Having that support, the team says, removes a great deal of stress.

"It's crazy how it all fell together, and I'm kind of pinching myself," JT Volz said.

While the Grizzlies will have just one boat competing this weekend — Oppy and Carson Volz comprise the entire roster at the moment — JT Volz expects numbers to grow once the fall sports seasons conclude and those students become available. The hope is to have six to eight anglers fishing out of multiple boats for winter and spring tournaments.

And ideally, the team will only grow in the future.

"Our goal now is to use this as a springboard to get more anglers to join the team," Hendricks said. "There's some teams out there in the college ranks that have both male and female anglers. They might have 15, 20, 30 people on their team."

Just making people aware of the team's existence is important, because many don't realize that competitive fishing at the collegiate level is even an option.

"They don't realize that people can go to college and get a degree and be a bass tournament fisherman," Franklin assistant Dan Pardue said. "Some of the pros that are out there now, all of them come through the college ranks. We just need to get more people to be aware of it."

This first true season of competition should help get the news out there — which is why Oppy is glad to be on board, even if it's only for this one full year.

"I'm really grateful that I get to be a part of it at the beginning, set the foundation," said Oppy, who's also excited to venture out and see (and fish) places he's never been before. "It's just really cool to see from where we were last year to this year, and it's only going to get better from there. ...

"I wish I could have done this all four years."

Now, future Grizzlies know that they can.