The Grant Thornton Invitational returns to Tiburón Golf Club at the Ritz-Carlton Naples, bringing the PGA Tour and LPGA Tour together for three days of mixed-team golf in southwest Florida. The 2025 edition is scheduled for December 12–14, with 16 two-person teams composed of one PGA Tour and one LPGA Tour professional. These pairs compete in a 54-hole event for equal prize money and a shared spotlight. Played on Tiburón’s Gold Course, the week leans into format variety, rotating through scramble, foursomes, and modified four-ball to keep scoring low and strategy in constant flux.
Launched in 2023, the Grant Thornton Invitational revived a concept that had been missing since the JCPenney Classic ended in 1999: a top-level, co-sanctioned mixed-team event where both men and women share a stage and high stakes. In just a few editions it has become a test case for what a more integrated future for professional golf might look like, with a shared purse and a deliberately balanced field signalling a tangible move toward parity. Slotted into the late-year window, it gives players freedom to experiment with partnerships and formats while offering the tours a platform for new stories.
The field is compact but loaded, typically featuring major winners, as well as Ryder Cup and Solheim Cup veterans. Recent line-ups include names such as Nelly Korda, Lydia Ko and Jason Day from the top tiers of the game. Their chemistry quickly becomes as valuable as ball-striking, with the sharpest teams pairing power with precision or matching an aggressive ball-striker to a putter who thrives on closing out birdie chances. Strategy turns with the formats: scramble encourages maximum aggression, foursomes punishes any miscommunication, and modified four-ball forces each duo to decide whose ball becomes the team’s identity on a given hole.
Tiburón’s Gold Course, framed by Florida wetlands and resort architecture, rewards creative angles and confident wedge play, with swing holes on its par 5s that can flip a match in a single surge. Around it, the setting feels more festival than grind, amplified by the resort backdrop and Live Fest concerts that run alongside the golf. On paper, the prize fund sits at $4 million with a seven-figure share for the champions; in practice, the week is a referendum on whether mixed-team golf deserves a regular, global place in the sport’s calendar.
As the 2025 Grant Thornton Invitational kickoff nears in Naples, the unknowns are as intriguing as the field sheet. Will an established partnership turn prior chemistry into a mini-dynasty, or will a new pairing redraw the blueprint for modern team golf in a single weekend? Will Tiburón reward raw aggression in scramble or the nerve to survive alternate shot, and which duo will handle a shared spotlight when the final putts fall on Sunday? For Living Sports readers, the call is simple: stay with the story, follow the shifting alliances and formats, and let this December week in Naples hint at where the game might be heading next.
