Bruce, 11-time Classic qualifier, dies at 73

Mickey Bruce, a three-time Bassmaster winner and one-time FLW Tour champion from Georgia who competed in 11 Classics in the 1980s and '90s, has died at age 73.

Three of Bruce's tour-level victories came on his home water, Lake Lanier. He earned $100,000 for winning the 1983 Super Bass II event and also triumphed in the 1994 Georgia Bassmaster Invitational and the 1999 FLW Tour stop. His other B.A.S.S. win was in 1989 at the St. Lawrence River in New York.

He had two 3rd-place Classic finishes – in 1989 at North Carolina's High Rock Lake and the following year at Lay Lake in Alabama. He participated in five FLW Championships with a best showing of 5th in 2004 at Alabama's Logan Martin Lake.

For his career, he competed in 185 Bassmaster events and won more than $550,000. On the FLW side, he fished 59 tournaments and earned a little more than $416,000.

Bruce was the runner-up to Kevin VanDam in the 2001 FLW Tour Angler of the Year race.

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