After a six-week hiatus, regular PGA Tour golf is back! Happy New Year to all those in the Betsperts Golf family and to everyone reading this. There is no better place to kick off the 2024 calendar year than the warmth, beauty, and lush green grass of Hawaii at The Sentry, played at the Plantation Course at Kapalua. Though the PGA Tour is experiencing a turbulent stretch due to the disruption brought on by the LIV Golf Tour, the defection of Jon Rahm, and seemingly futile attempts at reaching an agreement with the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia and other entities to merge all of the different golf leagues, The Sentry event represents golf\u2019s rebirth and hopefully a calendar year full of intrigue and fierce competition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Along with it being one of the Tour\u2019s \u201cSignature Events\u201d, this year\u2019s tournament takes on added significance because of the devasting Maui wildfires that killed 97 people earlier in the year in Lahaina which is just 13 miles away from Kapalua. The fires also destroyed more than 2,000 structures. And though the property at the Kapalua Resort was not affected, a third of the staff who live in the Lahaina area lost their homes. Said Tyler Dennis, the Tour\u2019s chief competition officer, \u201cThere is no other organization in sport which rallies around those in need like the PGA Tour. Given the overwhelming support for playing the tournament, the Tour and The Sentry are currently working on plans to further raise awareness and assist with fundraising and community service to Maui in a thoughtful and respectful manner.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since 1999, the Tour has kicked off the new year with this tournament which has been held at the Kapalua Resort near Lahaina on the island of Maui. Kapalua is where paradise and golf meet. Once the site of a large pineapple plantation, it\u2019s such a unique course that you can see whales breaching in the distance on the first tee, and on the 18th tee can wallop a 450+ yard drive. Thanks to the wind and elevation changes, it is one of the few courses on Earth where the yardage on the scorecard is irrelevant on many holes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This compilation of the world\u2019s best golfers is a unique, no-cut, small-field event, played on a low-scoring par-73 course that has expansive fairways, numerous elevation changes, and gusty coastal breezes. Thanks to the combination of easy-to-hit fairways and greens, it\u2019s one of the most genuine birdie fests on Tour, and it favors the best wedge players and the hottest putters. It plays the complete opposite of a target-style golf course. The allowance for creativity and multiple options for each shot makes it a fun track to play. Players with every shot in their bag who can maneuver the terrain and manage the wind will best position themselves for success at Kapalua.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After a wind-blown 2020 where the winning score by Justin Thomas was only 14-under par, the past three events have seen scoring return to the more common finishing number of 25-under or lower. After Cam Smith took birdie-making to another level in 2022 by winning with an event record of 34-under, last year, Jon Rahm took advantage of Collin Morikawa\u2019s final-round collapse by rallying from as many as nine strokes back to win by two.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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The Field<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
In the past, as its previous name implied, \u201cThe Sentry Tournament of Champions\u201d (now just \u201cThe Sentry\u201d) has always only been for PGA Tour winners. Things are changing this year with the top 50 from the previous year\u2019s FedEx Cup along with any other Tour winner from 2023 eligible to participate. Currently, 59 players are in the field, including 21 of the top 25, and 38 of the top 50 golfers in the Official World Golf Rankings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Sentry kicks off the \u201cHawaii Swing\u201d (which concludes with next week\u2019s Sony Open) and is meant as a paradise of escape from the cold winter enveloping most of America by providing the best players on Tour with a rewarding experience at the Kapalua Resort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With everyone in the field coming in with at least a month off from competition, it\u2019s always interesting to see which players have been grinding away back home over the break and come out sharp in the first round. The resort setup is meant to help the pros ease back into the grind after (mostly) putting their clubs away over the holidays. Related to returning from a long break, Patrick Cantlay remarked, \u201cIt\u2019s a good golf course to kind of shake some rust off. The fairways are big and there\u2019s lots of space out here to hit shots and it\u2019s also a golf course where you have to be very creative, and so you have to play all the different shots out here to be successful.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Past Sentry champions that will be teeing it off this week include Harris English, Xander Schauffele, and Jordan Spieth. The past two winners at Kapalua, Smith and Rahm, are both ineligible to play due to joining the LIV Golf League. All of the other top-ranked players in the world who qualified will participate this week except for Rory McIlroy who has once again decided to skip this event and begin his season in Dubai in a couple of weeks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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