At 25 yards, the buck turned and presented a perfect broadside shot. Gates uttered a soft mouth grunt, which stopped the deer in its tracks.

With the sight pin holding solid behind the buck's shoulder, he released the arrow.

The shaft passed clean through the deer's chest cavity, and the monarch bolted to the edge of the field.

He stood there, hunched up and shaking his tail wildly -- signs of a possible liver hit. It appeared as if he was going to go down, but he started to walk off slowly.

Confident that he could get another arrow into the buck, Gates took a risk: He got out of the blind and began to stalk the deer.

He cut an angle to where he last saw the wounded giant.

And as he rounded a cluster of trees, the hunter and the hunted came face to face, at less than 10 yards!

The wounded buck was quartering toward Gates, but appeared to be mortally wounded and unable to move. Gates raised his bow and released another arrow.

The wounded buck charged off again, but quickly bedded down.

At that point, Gates knew the best thing to do was to back out. He had made two good hits on the deer, and he knew it wouldn't take long for the buck to bleed out.

Gates returned home to wait. After he outfitted his daughter and oldest son with flashlights, the trio set out with Gates' uncle to take up the track. With very little drama, the group discovered the deer a short distance away, lying peacefully along the field edge.

Gates was speechless. The buck was gigantic -- bigger than he had thought, and certainly a sight to behold. He knew this was his hunt of a lifetime, one he would never forget.

Though recovering the buck was a great event, his most cherished moment may have been while their group was following the blood trail.

His children had looked up at him and said, "Dad, this is fun!"

It was a truly joyous and emotional time, and a story Gates will never get tired of sharing.

Some time later, Gates hooked up with scorers representing all the major scoring organizations -- the Northeast Big Buck Club, the Pope and Young Club, the Boone and Crockett Club and the New York State Big Buck Club.

The buck was officially panel-scored after the mandatory 60-day drying period.

The outcome was worth the wait!

This great buck's gross B&C score was 208 5/8 non-typical. The buck had 22 scorable points, with a 12-point typical frame and 10 abnormal points totaling 40 4/8 inches.

After asymmetry deductions, the buck tallied a net B&C score of 196 2/8 non-typical.

The inside spread was just over 20 inches, and the main beams totaled 23 2/8 inches on the right and 26 3/8 inches on the left.

No tines were exceedingly long: In fact, none was longer than 8 inches. But the strength of the number of scorable points -- particularly the abnormal growth -- drove the gross score to the 200-inch level.

MORE GREAT BUCKS
Other great bucks have been arrowed in Suffolk County in the last decade. In 2002, according to NBBC records, Mark Butta took a great 15-point non-typical with a gross score of 179 4/8 and a net P&Y score of 170 1/8.

In 1997, Anthony Alesi connected on a 173 2/8 gross, 166 1/8 net 19-point non-typical buck.

And in 2002, of course, Gates took the buck mentioned earlier in this article. So there's certainly great potential for big bow bucks from this densely populated county.