Next year the LPGA will finish what it starts in Hawai'i when the Kapalua LPGA Classic debuts at the Maui resort's Bay Course in October.

The tour is expected to announce the new $1.5 million tournament this morning from its Florida headquarters.

The 72-hole event in 2008 will be held during the week of Oct. 6 to 12 or Oct. 13 to 18. Dates are expected to be finalized next month. It comes before the tour heads to Asia and probably will be the LPGA's final full-field domestic event of the year. A title sponsor is being sought.

The tour has started its season in Hawai'i the past two Februarys, with the SBS Open at Turtle Bay and Fields Open in Hawai'i, at Ko Olina.

It will be Kapalua's first LPGA and full-field event. The resort opens the PGA Tour season each year with the $5.5 million Mercedes-Benz Championship, for winners from the previous year. That took the place of the Lincoln-Mercury Kapalua International, a late-season invitational held from 1982 to 1997 at the Bay and Plantation courses.

To help welcome the LPGA, Kapalua has signed Morgan Pressel to be the resort's official LPGA touring professional. Pressel, 18, won this year's Kraft Nabisco Championship to become the youngest major champion in LPGA history.

Pressel shared the lead going into the final round of this year's SBS Open and ultimately finished fourth. She was third at Ko Olina — soon after a visit to Kapalua.

"We became quite fond of her," said Gary Planos, Kapalua's senior vice president of resort operations. "What we're looking for with Morgan is an ambassador on the LPGA tour for us. ... I think Morgan will do a great job representing the resort and helping us recruit players."

Pressel, who qualified for the 2001 U.S. Open at age 12, also has been an outspoken critic of Hawai'i teen golfer Michelle Wie, often questioning why she receives so many exemptions.

Pressel currently is sixth on the Rolex Women's World Golf Ranking and has six Top-10 finishes this year.

"I can't wait to tee it up at the Bay Course in October 2008," Pressel said.

Pressel, who is from Florida, comes from a family of athletes. Her late mother was a tennis player at the University of Michigan, and her uncle, Aaron Krickstein, was once ranked sixth in world tennis.

'A LOT OF YOUTH'

Planos said the LPGA is "a new market."

"You look at the average age of their champions now and it's in the 20s," he said. "That's what we're looking at: How do we engage with this new market?

"What we've seen is Morgan, Ai Miyazato, Michelle (Wie) down the road when she gets out of school, Stephanie Kono. There is a lot of youth ahead in the LPGA and we think that's exciting. It's totally different and fun for us."

Kono, a Punahou senior, trains with Jerry King at Kapalua Golf Academy.

The Kapalua LPGA Classic contract runs through 2012. It will be the first major event played on the Bay Course since Kapalua International ended. The course also was the site of the 1996 U.S. Women's Public Links Championship.

The Classic also will help fill the fall puka left when the PGA Grand Slam of Golf moved off Kaua'i after last year. October and November had been busy months for Hawai'i golf, with the LPGA, PGA seniors and PGA Tour pros all here for events. Now January and February are the hot months. Hawai'i will be the site of eight professional tournaments to start 2008.

"Fall used to be a happening time here," Planos said from Maui. "We had fall events at Kapalua and Ka'anapali. We've found that fall has become a dead season. We want to create some excitement at a time where it's lacking now. We thought the LPGA would be a perfect match for the Bay Course."

COURSE CHANGES

The Bay can be stretched to 6,600 yards, about 800 yards shorter than the Plantation where the PGA plays. The Bay will close its back nine next month to redo the greens, with the front nine scheduled for the same changes before the 2009 Kapalua LPGA Classic.

According to Planos, the greens will have new grass and be "brought out" to their original dimensions. New drainage and irrigation also will be installed. The changes will help allow for more tournament hole locations.

"We think the LPGA is an exciting new product," Planos said. "It matches up with the revitalization of the Bay Course. That hasn't had a televised event for 10 years. We want this so we can get some lift within the resort and on the course."

Reach Ann Miller at amiller@honoluluadvertiser.com.