BRADENTON, Fla. — The Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions kicked off the 2025 LPGA Tour season in a big way last week. A Lim Kim won in dominant fashion after leading wire-to-wire at Lake Nona Golf and Country Club, but Rolex Women’s World Golf Rankings No. 1 Nelly Korda made things interesting coming down the stretch, posting a 7-under 65 that saw her challenge Kim late on Sunday afternoon and threaten to capture another victory after her seven-win season in 2024. Minjee Lee also popped off with some fireworks of her own in Orlando, firing a bogey-free 10-under 62 in the final round to finish in a tie for fourth in her tournament debut.

After all that excitement, more thrills are sure to await fans at the Founders Cup, and with a venue that’s still fairly new to most of the LPGA Tour contingent and a full field of 120 of the world’s best players, it’s going to be anyone’s game this week in Bradenton, Fla. Here are a few players to watch in the second event of the 2025 LPGA Tour season:

Nelly Korda

Once again, Bradenton native Nelly Korda is the favorite this week at Bradenton Country Club. The 26-year-old kicked off her historic 2024 season with a victory at this venue last year, winning in a two-hole playoff over Lydia Ko, extra holes that actually set the tone for the rest of the season to come. The Rolex Rankings No. 1 made her 2025 debut last week at the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions, finishing runner-up to A Lim Kim after posting a 65 on day four at Lake Nona, which was the 15-time LPGA Tour winner’s fifth career top-five and sixth top-10 result at the first event of the season.

Korda is playing in her seventh Founders Cup presented by U.S. Virgin Islands this week and has earned four top-20 finishes in the event named for the 13 founding members of the LPGA organization, the best of which is a tie for second that came in 2019 when the tournament was contested at Wildfire Golf Club in Arizona. But while she isn’t technically the defending champion at the Founders Cup this year, Korda is the last player on Tour to win at Bradenton Country Club at the 2024 LPGA Drive On Championship, making this event feel a bit like a title defense for one of the game’s strongest talents.

Looking at data provided by KPMG Performance Insights, Korda had a consistent performance through the bag at Drive On last year, ranking inside the top 20 in strokes gained off the tee (2, +1.11), strokes gained approach (10, +1.30), strokes gained around the green (14, +0.48) and strokes gained putting (18, +0.94). She will likely need a performance similar to that if she wants to capture another title here in front of a hometown crowd, but if her play last week in Orlando is any indication, Korda is in more than fine form and could pick up another show-stopping victory early in the season at the Founders Cup.

Jin Young Ko

Jin Young Ko has been a dominant force at the Founders Cup presented by U.S. Virgin Islands in the past, winning the tournament three times in her six previous starts, all three of which came within a four-year span from 2019 to 2023, excluding the 2020 season in which the event was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, Ko earned all three of her Founders Cup titles when the event was played in either Arizona or New Jersey, with her first victory coming in 2019 at Wildfire Golf Club in Phoenix, the second coming in 2021 at Mountain Ridge Country Club in West Caldwell, N.J. and her most recent coming in 2023 at Upper Montclair Country Club in Clifton, N.J.

Ko teed it up last week at the Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions for the first time in her LPGA Tour career, having traditionally skipped the first event of the season in order to spend more time at home in the Republic of Korea. She tied for fourth at Lake Nona after posting rounds of 69-70-70-65, and through one event, Ko is currently tied for fourth in strokes gained total (+2.29), ranked 10th in strokes gained driving (+0.32) and sitting at 13th in both strokes gained approach (+0.58) and strokes gained around the green (+0.05), looking at data provided by KPMG Performance Insights. Even though she doesn’t have very many victories in Florida when looking at the 15 titles she’s collected since joining the organization in 2018, Ko isn’t someone to be ignored when picking winners on the LPGA Tour.

Auston Kim

Epson Tour graduate Auston Kim is in her second year as an LPGA Tour member and will be looking to build upon the successful rookie season she had last year as the calendar flips to 2025. Kim made 20 cuts in 27 starts on Tour in 2024 and earned three top 10s and six total top-25 results, ultimately finishing 63rd in the Race to the CME Globe, three spots shy of qualifying for the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship. One of those top-10 performances actually came in her rookie debut last year at the LPGA Drive On Championship at Bradenton Country Club, as the Epson Tour winner tied for sixth in her first event as a full-fledged LPGA member in Bradenton, Fla.

Another upside to Kim is the fact that she hails from St. Augustine, Fla. and possesses a wealth of knowledge about Florida golf courses that should help her at a facility like this year’s Founders Cup venue. Bermudagrass greens can be tricky to read and putt well on for players that aren’t super familiar with the grass type, but in the third round at Bradenton Country Club last year, Kim showed some strength on the greens, as she averaged 1.56 putts per hole en route to carding a 7-under 64. If she can conjure up something similar to that over four rounds at the Founders Cup, Kim just might be able to recreate or better that T6 result in 2025, something that would help this dark horse make an early impact as an LPGA Tour sophomore.

Players to Watch: 2025 Founders Cup presented by U.S. Virgin Islands

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