The First Look: THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES

Newly crowned PGA TOUR Player of the Year Brooks Koepka heads to South Korea for a start on his 2018-19 season, joining defending champion Justin Thomas atop the lineup for the second leg of the TOUR’s Asia Swing. Ian Poulter, whose singles win over Dustin Johnson put Europe on the brink of taking back the Ryder Cup in France, heads a list of four winning Europeans coming to The Club at Nine Bridges. The field also includes Hall of Famer Ernie Els, who will captain the International squad at next year’s Presidents Cup. FIELD NOTES: Billy Horschel, who registered a trio of top-3 finishes in the FedExCup Playoffs, gives the 78-man field four players who placed among last year’s FedExCup top 10. Jason Day and Hideki Matsuyama also are among 13 entrants who were at the TOUR Championship last month. … Paul Casey, Alex Noren and Tyrrell Hatton join Poulter in South Korea off the winning European Ryder Cup roster. Thomas and Koepka are the only representatives from the U.S. lineup. … In all, the field features 15 of the top 40 players in the Official World Golf Ranking. … Koepka, Thomas, Day and Els are among a dozen major championship winners set to tee it up at Nine Bridges. … A total of 22 players will make their third start in as many weeks of the new season. FEDEXCUP: Winner receives 500 points. STORYLINES: Koepka opens his season in quest of something he jokes he doesn’t have enough of – a trophy that isn’t a major. Three of his four career PGA TOUR wins have been majors, including this year’s U.S. Open and PGA Championship. … Thomas, previously a back-to-back winner in Malaysia (2015-16), now seeks to match the feat at another Asian stop. … Matsuyama, who finished no worse than 15th in all four FedExCup Playoffs events, comes to Nine Bridges for the first time in hopes of giving the event its first Asian winner. … Sungjae Im, fourth at the Safeway Open in his rookie debut after topping the Web.com Tour in earnings, is among 12 Korean pros seeking to bring fans a homegrown winner. The list also includes THE PLAYERS 2017 winner Si Woo Kim and former U.S. Amateur champion Byeong Hun An. … The CJ Cup marks the third big event in as many weeks for Korean fans, after Incheon played host to the LPGA’s UL International Crown team event – won by a South Korean foursome – and the KEB Hana Bank Championship that followed. COURSE: The Club at Nine Bridges, 7,196 yards, par 72. The only Korean course ranked among the world’s top 100, Nine Bridges winds its way through rolling pineland on Jeju Island just south of Korea’s mainland. Laid out by David Dale and Ronald Fream, the club opened in 2001 and one year later became one of the first Asian venues to appear on the LPGA schedule, as Se Ri Pak won the inaugural. Korean winners followed the next three years as well. Nine Bridges also is the longtime host of the biannual World Club Championship, where champions from top-level clubs around the world gather to contest a global title. The course actually features eight bridges – the ninth is metaphorical as a link from the club to members and guests. 72-HOLE RECORD: 279, Justin Thomas (2017). 18-HOLE RECORD: 63, Justin Thomas (1st round, 2017). LAST YEAR: Thomas won the inaugural edition for his third Asian crown, opening with a 63 but still needing two playoff holes to outlast Marc Leishman. Three birdies on the back nine lifted Leishman even with Thomas, briefly taking the lead until the freshly crowned FedExCup winner made birdie on No. 18. Both made par on the first replay at No. 18, before Leishman found the water on the second extra pass. Victory capped a rather unusual week for Thomas, who set the bar with his opening 63 but didn’t break 70 in any of his other rounds. It still went into the books as Thomas’ seventh career victory, adding the CJ Cup title to a pair of wins at the CIMB Classic in Malaysia. Australia’s Cameron Smith took third, one shot out of the playoff when he failed to birdie No. 18. HOW TO FOLLOW TELEVISION: Wednesday-Saturday, 10 p.m.-2 a.m. ET (Golf Channel). PGA TOUR LIVE: None. RADIO: None.

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