I fish a small creek in mid-west Ohio where I grew up and it's loaded with SM. Caught dozens of 12-14 inch SM this past Saturday and they were fighters! Even the dinks hit like 20" fish! Of the small tournament we had on the river, the largest SM this past weekend was 18 3/4 inches long. Nice healthy fish. Though we were fishing for bass, we caught a catfish, crappie, and a few saugeye as well. Very fun to fish the creeks up there! What I like most about that club/tournament is that everything is catch, measure, and immediate release - points are calculated via length, not weight so there's no weigh in and the survival rate is much higher.