First place finishers at 2025 Nipawin Hawks Tobin Lake Walleye Championship (Nipawin Hawks/Facebook)

By Ben Tompkins

Walleye Championship

Hawks raise nearly $40k at 14th annual fishing tournament

Jul 17, 2025 | 10:09 AM

The Nipawin Hawks held their annual fishing tournament this past weekend, raising nearly $40,000 for their organization.

The 14th annual Tobin Lake Walleye Championship is one of the club’s biggest fundraisers of the year.

“It is one of our major fundraisers, so it’s fairly important that we keep it going. Somewhere around $38,000 should be how much we got, which is what we’ve typically been seeing these last few years,” explained event organizer Debbie Posehn.

“I think the tournament went really well, the fishermen all seemed happy, and I know they were catching lots of fish, so that’s the main thing. Everyone always seems to be quite happy when they come up for this tournament on fish at Tobin.”

A couple of Hawks players came back to help out with the event, as they ride in the measure boats and help with the setup.

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When the tournament originally began, they had just 12 to 15 teams participating, but now they’re up to 100.

Anglers compete in teams of two, with five fish allowed to be caught per day, with one of those fish allowed to be over the slot size.

After the two-day tournament, which ran Friday and Saturday (with Sunday set aside for an alternate day in case of bad weather), 10 fish in total, per team, were submitted.

The top 10 teams are paid out, and then a bonus tournament is held for the top five. Fishers come from Alberta, the United States, and, of course, locally. The top team was paid out $22,450.

This tournament will also mark the last one that Posehn organized.

“I’ve worked off and on for the Hawks for the last 12 years, and I helped with the tournament back in the very beginning when it was really struggling to get going. The last three years, I guess I’ve done it pretty much full time. It’s hard to say goodbye to the fishermen, they sure make the event worthwhile for me, but I’m sure somebody will come along and take it up and do a great job,” she concluded.

“We definitely need lots of support from the community and the areas surrounding, and we appreciate all the fishermen who travel and come all this way up to fish with us for a few days. They really seem to enjoy it, and they made my job completely enjoyable.”

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Ben.Tompkins@pattisonmedia.com

On X @BenTompkins_8