The PGA Tour, as expected, is leaving the state of Hawaii starting in 2027, choosing to not return to its long-time season-opening venue of Kapalua on Maui and also deciding to not return to the Sony Open in Honolulu, which has hosted an event since 1965.
The Tour on Monday confirmed a Sports Business Journal report that it would no longer be playing at either location and that it is considering turning the Sony Open at Waialae Country Club into a PGA Tour Champions event.
“We are grateful to the Plantation Course at Kapalua, Kapalua Resort, Maui County and the State of Hawaii for their longtime support of our season-opening PGA Tour event, as well as the fans, partners and volunteers across Maui who have supported the event throughout the years,” the Tour said in a statement, adding that it will share more details on its 2027 schedule later.
The Kapalua event that became known as the Sentry after first being called the Tournament of Champions dates to 1999 and was the soft-opening kickoff to the season, followed by a hop over to Honolulu for the Sony Open.
But the Kapalua event was scuttled this year due to an irrigation and water drought issue on Maui that impacted the golf course and caused the Tour last fall to decide not to play the event. The signature event was not replaced on the schedule and the 2026 season began at the Sony.
Now it won’t start in Hawaii at all, as had been discussed, due to new CEO Brian Rolapp’s desire to consolidate the schedule and begin later in January as to not complete directly with the NFL playoffs that consume the early-year calendar.
Where the PGA Tour will begin in 2027 remains to be seen
Where that start will be remains to be decided. Rolapp said at the Players Championship last month that he wants to “open big with a marquee event at an iconic venue in the west, among other things, allowing us to finish on network television in primetime on the East Coast.” With a late-January start, as he suggested, that could mean potentially venues such as Torrey Pines or PGA West in the Palm Springs, Calif., area, among several possibilities.
“We are proud to have sponsored the Sentry in Kapalua for eight years,” said Stephanie Smith, Sentry’s chief marketing & brand officer. “We have said from the beginning, we love Maui and Maui is a Sentry community not unlike our hometown of Stevens Point, Wis. We cherish the friends and partnerships we have formed over the past several years. Our commitment to the island runs deep, and we remain committed to being active in the community.”
Sentry has a sponsorship deal in place with the Tour through 2035 and Sports Business Journal reported it could be in line to take over the title sponsorship of the event at Torrey Pines, where Farmers Insurance bowed out as sponsor after this year’s tournament.
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This article was originally published on www.si.com as The PGA Tour Will Not Return to This Iconic Golf State in 2027.
