Bradley Eckman 181 3/8 by compound bow on 10/25/25
Beaver Co. PA. 14 points
The buck was a habitual scraper.
It visited, refreshed and re-refreshed a long scrape under an oak at the edge of a corn field. It hit another deep one under an elm that it visited on the way to its bed. The tell-tale markings led Bradley Eckman to victory on Oct. 25, 2025.
It was there, on the 125-acre parcel owned by family friend Barb Liberato, that Bradley arrowed an impressive 14-pointer that ranks number one by compound bow in Beaver Co., PA.
Bradley, 28, is a wastewater operator for the Rochester, PA, area. He says 15 years had passed since his family hunted those cornfields and hills. But his brother, Jeremy, had gained permission for them to put their stands on Barb’s land, once again.
“My brother and I ran nine trail cams over there. I like cameras, but they only tell one picture. I’m a big scouter. I’ve walked the property three times over so I could narrow it down to where he was bedding. Then I moved my cameras to be more effective.”
In late September, the brothers ran into a fellow hunter who showed them a picture of a deer taken 200 yards from where Bradley set up his climber. “The fellow hung his trail cam 10 feet high in a tree looking down. From that perspective, the buck appeared to be a 160-class.”
In reality, the Eckman buck measured more than 181 inches. Its place in the Buckmasters Trophy Record book is second in the state of Pennsylvania by compound bow for the regular antler category.
“The evening before I got lucky, my brother called to say the buck was at my climber stand right now, while I was at the edge of the cornfield. I was heartbroken. I stayed put, hoping he’d come to the corn, but he never did.”
The next morning, before sunrise, Bradley was in his climber, 20 feet up in a hardwood. The day was cloudy, mid 40s, with a wind that was blowing toward the west. He was surrounded by thick underbrush.
“I went home at midday and messed around with the kids. Jeremy and I went back out, and he called me an hour before dark and said he saw a huge buck in the corn. I was in my climber; I debated on climbing down. It was a good 400 yards to where my brother saw him so instead, I decided to stay put.”
Twenty minutes later, Bradley heard crashing through the thick underbrush. “My stand was on a steep hill that levels off, like the seat of a bench. The buck hit that bench and was walking to his bedroom. For a 181-inch deer, he was daylighting like no other.”
Pennsylvania gets a lot of hunting pressure, so a lot of deer stay nocturnal, Bradley says. “Big deer are hard to kill. PA is not known for harvesting big deer. A lot of guys shoot the first deer they see.”
A week earlier, one of Brad’s trail cams took a video of the buck at 8 a.m. It was feeding on acorns and hit the scrape on the way to bed. No hunters were to be seen.
“The brush was disgusting — it was hands-and-knees thick,” he said. “Nobody else wanted to come around and hunt there.”
When the buck reached the flat place, Bradley made a kissing sound that stopped it at the hunter’s 9 o’clock position.
“My arrow was nocked. I put the release on. When he was about to come into an open lane my bow went up. I settled my 20-yard pin on him when he got broadside. I was thinking, I can’t believe this is happening.”
After Bradley released the shot, a flood of emotions welled up. “I knew I’d just shot the biggest deer of my life. He ran downhill and out of sight. I didn’t hear him fall.”
After checking his shot site, Bradley stuck the bloody arrow in the ground and headed to find his brother. They decided to give the buck time to expire.
Bradley got a case of shooter’s doubts. “I worried that I hit too far back. Of course I didn’t know it at the time, but I double lunged him with a good shot.”
The buck ended up going 115 yards.
Jeremy and a cousin, Ryan Kemerer, stopped for supper before tracking, but Bradley says his nerves were too jittery for food.
“We followed the blood, hit another bench, and then the floodgates opened. The heavy trail led us to my buck, 10 yards later.”
Brad didn’t have a great feeling going into the hunt, he says. “I didn’t have the best wind. It was a west wind, blowing from me to the edge of the bedding area.”
Jeremy said he wanted Bradley, his kid brother, to shoot that buck, even though he was just as close at several points. Both agree, “That’s the kind of buck Jackie Bushman would go after.”
Buckmasters scorer Will Leonard taped the Eckman buck at 181 3/8 inches.
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