A peaceful atmosphere covers the lake. With a slight whoosh and a small plunk, a line is cast into the water. The trees and surroundings watch with bated breath as the fishermen calmly wait for the undeniable tug of a fish. The fishing club sits on the scenic lake, on the hunt for the perfect bass.

Started with a love for fishing and students in mind, the fishing club is a group of students who love to compete and love to fish.

“I love to fish and when I was younger I fished in bass tournaments and I know now that Texas has a lot of fishing clubs, and the kids can earn lots of scholarships,” Fishing Club sponsor Lisa Curry said. “It’s really all about the kids.”

The club formed when a student, senior Chase Thompson, asked Curry to start the organization. She looked into it, and decided to make the idea a reality.

With most of the club members having fished their whole lives, the nine competing members bonded over their love of being on the water and proving themselves as skilled fishermen.

“I love the feeling of catching something after you’ve been fishing for hours, seeing no one else catch anything but you get out there and catch yourself something,” freshman John Thomas Henry said.

The club, which meets every Friday during lunch in room 851, formed midway through the year, leaving them too late for the majority of the fishing tournament season.

“The kids can advance to regionals and State. That’s my goal for next year, to have kids actually go to regionals because when we started the club, we started it late. So we didn’t get in enough tournaments for the kids to advance,” Curry said. “I think we would have gotten them to advance to region and advance to State, if we had started earlier.”

Despite this, the club still went to two tournaments, the Lake of the Pines and Cedar Creek. Place is determined by the weight of the fish caught within a certain time frame. At the first tournament, Lake of the Pines, the best team placed 64th. However, at Cedar Creek, the club’s second tournament, Wylie East teams took fifth and 12th place out of over 150 teams.

“The best part about competing is knowing that your opponent doesn’t have a bigger fish than you do,” junior Patrick Diaz said.

Before the tournaments, the club prepares by doing a little research.

“A lot of people think that when you go fishing, you just go fish. There’s a lot of stuff involved in that. Is there cloud coverage? What temperature is the water? Are the fish spawning? What color bait do you use? What kind of bait do you use? It’s challenging. You have to do a little research and study up on it,” Curry said.

Every member of the club has a shared wish: to help people get out there and get hooked on fishing.

“Next year, I just want to build it (the club) in popularity. Nowadays, people are just on their phone or watching TV and they never go outside,” Henry said.