The Sentry Tournament of Champions returns to the Plantation Course at Kapalua next week with 39 of the PGA Tour’s best officially committing to the annual stop on Maui on Friday.

New for 2023 and beyond, the TOC field now includes the top 30 players from the final FedEx Cup standings who qualified for the previous year’s Tour Championship in addition to the traditional qualifying standard of being a PGA Tour winner from the previous calendar year.

The 2023 field includes four FedEx Cup champions, eight of the top 10 in the Official World Golf Ranking, and nine of the top 10 in the current 2022-23 FedEx Cup standings, including standings leader Seamus Power.

Additionally, the field includes 12 first-time winners.

“We are so thrilled with the field that we have,” Max Novena, the event’s first-year executive director, said when the field became official at 12:30 p.m. Friday. “It’s a really accomplished group of players — we have the winners from last year and I think the expansion in eligibility to include the top-30 players who made it to the Tour Championship in East Lake, just huge — 39 players in the field and we’re really excited for next week.”

The only two players eligible who elected not to come to Kapalua are Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry — McIlroy is the current No. 1 on the OWGR, while Lowry is No. 20.

Defending champion Cameron Smith, currently No. 3 in the OWGR, is ineligible to be here after joining the rival LIV Golf series.

No. 2 Scottie Scheffler, the reigning Masters champion, No. 4 Patrick Cantlay, No. 5 Jon Rahm, No. 6 Xander Schauffele, No. 7 Will Zalatoris, No. 8 Justin Thomas, No. 9 Matthew Fitzpatrick, and No. 10 Viktor Hovland are here.

There is a strong local connection as well with No. 11 Collin Morikawa and No. 12 Tony Finau. Morikawa’s great grandparents used to own a restaurant in Lahaina, and Finau is a former pro at Turtle Bay on Oahu and is the first PGA Tour member of Samoan and Tongan decent.

“I think the level of competition on tour is so good — you’ve probably heard me say multiple times 2022 was really the year of the repeat winner — and it had happened in the past,” Novena said. “To know that going forward, we will always have a field of at least 30 players, potentially even more than 40 players.”

Novena said the addition of the 10 players in this field who did not win in 2022 but survived the season-long FedEx Cup points chase to make the top 30 at the Tour Championship is a big step to ensuring the strength of the field here year in and year out.

“I think the expanded eligibility really rewards the entire body of work of the player throughout the seasons, and we have the good fortune of adding players like Adam Scott, Collin Morikawa, Cam Young, who won rookie of the year,” Novena said. “So, it’s really enhanced the field that we’re going to be able to showcase next week.”

Novena said his new gig is a dream come true.

He has seen the tournament he oversees become one of the tour’s 13 “elevated” events that now has a $20 million purse and is one of 20 events that the top players have committed to playing, and Sentry added five years to its title sponsorship commitment in August.

The event is celebrating its 25th year on Maui and is now locked in through 2035 with Sentry as the sponsor — and next year, the tour will switch back to the schedule officially starting here instead of the current wrap-around slate that begins after the Tour Championship in the fall.

“Having the time of my life,” Novena said. “It’s been an absolute blast. I came back to the PGA Tour for the values of this organization, the amazing people and of course for the amazing community here on Maui.

“You probably heard me say seven months ago, eight months ago when we first spoke, it’s been a really warm welcome and I felt that aloha spirit all the way through.”

Tickets for the event — the pro-am is Wednesday and the tournament runs Thursday through Sunday — are available at sentrytournamentofchampions.com.

* Robert Collias is at rcollias@mauinews.com

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2023 SENTRY TOURNAMENT OF CHAMPIONS FIELD

Keegan Bradley

Ryan Brehm*

Sam Burns

Patrick Cantlay

Corey Conners

Tony Finau

Matt Fitzpatrick*

Brian Harman

Russell Henley

Tom Hoge*

Max Homa

Billy Horschel

Viktor Hovland

Mackenzie Hughes

Sungjae Im

Tom Kim*

K.H. Lee

Luke List*

Hideki Matsuyama

Collin Morikawa

Trey Mullinax*

J.T. Poston

Seamus Power

Jon Rahm

Chad Ramey*

Chez Reavie

Xander Schauffele

Scottie Scheffler*

Adam Scott

J.J. Spaun*

Jordan Spieth

Scott Stallings

Sepp Straka*

Adam Svensson*

Sahith Theegala

Justin Thomas

Aaron Wise

Cameron Young

Will Zalatoris*

* – First-time winner