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Sentry TOC proves to be can’t-miss event

Of 45 players eligible, 42 are set to play at Kapalua next week

Dustin Johnson tees off during the second round of the Masters on Nov. 13. Johnson, the world’s No. 1-ranked player who went on to win his first Masters title, leads a stacked field for next week’s Sentry Tournament of Champions at the Kapalua Plantation Course. — AP file photo

The field for the 2021 Sentry Tournament of Champions became final at noon on Friday, and the list of 42 entrants looks impressive.

The field includes three FedEx Cup champions, 28 of the top 30 from the 2019-20 FedEx Cup standings as well as eight of the top 10 in the Official World Golf Ranking and six first-timers.

“Best is, of course, a subjective term, right? But man it would be hard to find a better field in terms of strength from top to bottom,” Alex Urban, the TOC Executive Director, said Friday. “You look at last year’s FedEx Cup rankings, even some of the guys that are at the bottom half, you’ve got major winners like Adam Scott and Sergio Garcia. Some really big-named guys.

“What I’ll say is I think maybe this is the most exciting field we’ve ever had. From top to bottom, man, it’s a heck of a group. I think everyone’s kind of champing at the bit to get out and play. The course looks great, guys have had some time off, so it should be fun.”

Only three of the 45 players eligible to be here — Rory McIlroy, Jim Herman and Terrell Hatton — decided not to enter.

Intriguing storylines abound for the TOC, which begins Thursday:

• Garcia, 40, will be back for the first time since 2006 — he won here in 2002 as a 22-year-old.

• Stewart Cink returns for the first time since 2010.

• Abraham Ancer and Carlos Ortiz will be the first two Mexicans in the field here since the event moved to Maui in 1999.

“I just like to start my years with good, solid golf,” Ancer told The Maui News earlier this week. “You want to get as many FedEx points as possible. That way you can really plan your schedule around your majors and WGCs. It gives you a little more freedom to just prepare and be really, really fresh and ready for the tournaments.

“You get a huge opportunity to get some good points and get a good start to 2021.”

• Six of the last eight events at the Plantation Course have been won by world No. 1 Dustin Johnson (2013, 2018), No. 11 Patrick Reed (2015), No. 3 Justin Thomas (2017, 2020) and No. 8 Xander Schauffele (2019).

Thomas defeated Reed and Schauffele in a three-way playoff here last year.

“It’s always fun. You look around the guys at Kapalua and, again, this year being different, but you look around and know that everybody else has won and they’ve earned the right to be there,” Thomas said. “So, it’s always a very, very strong field with a lot of players that are ready to have a good week, but also enjoy the week in Hawaii.”

The field was expanded from its usual winners-only format to include non-winners who qualified for the 2020 Tour Championship after 11 events were canceled because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

As a result, this year’s field is the largest ever for the TOC at Kapalua, surpassing the 2003 event that saw 37 players start the year here.

There were 28 winners of PGA Tour events last calendar year and 17 more players were added to the eligibility list as top-30 finishers on the FedEx Cup playoff list.

* Robert Collias is at rcollias@mauinews.com

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SENTRY TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS

2021 FIELD

Thursday-Jan. 10 • At Kapalua Plantation Course

Abraham Ancer

Daniel Berger

Patrick Cantlay

Cameron Champ

Stewart Cink

Bryson DeChambeau

Harris English

Tony Finau

Sergio Garcia

Brian Gay

Lanto Griffin

Billy Horschel

Viktor Hovland

Mackenzie Hughes

Sungjae Im

Dustin Johnson

Kevin Kisner

Jason Kokrak

Martin Laird

Andrew Landry

Marc Leishman

Hideki Matsuyama

Collin Morikawa

Sebastián Muñoz

Kevin Na

Joaquin Niemann

Carlos Ortiz

Ryan Palmer

Jon Rahm

Patrick Reed

Xander Schauffele

Scottie Scheffler

Adam Scott

Webb Simpson

Cameron Smith

Robert Streb

Hudson Swafford

Nick Taylor

Justin Thomas

Michael Thompson

Brendon Todd

Richy Werenski

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