HUMBLE, Texas -- A strong field is on hand this week at the Shell Houston Open as players make their final preparations for the Masters Tournament, the first major championship of the season. Since 1934, only five players have won the week before they earned a green jacket.

• Phil Mickelson was the latest to do so in 2006, when he won the BellSouth Classic. He is joined by Sandy Lyle (1988 Greater Greensboro Open), Art Wall (1959 Azalea Open), Sam Snead (1949 Greater Greensboro Open) and Ralph Guldahl (1939 Greater Greensboro Open).

• More than 100 players have an extra incentive to win this week. A victory would earn them the final spot available in the 2008 Masters field.

• Adam Scott looks to win a PGA TOUR title for the third consecutive year when he defends his title this week at the Shell Houston Open.

• A year ago at Redstone Golf Club's Tournament Course, Scott entered the final round in a five-way tie for second place, three strokes behind third-round leader Bubba Watson. All Scott did was shoot a 66 on the last day to roll to a three-shot victory over Stuart Appleby and Watson.

• This season, Adam Scott has played three TOUR events, with his best finish coming two weeks ago at the WGC-CA Championship, where he tied for ninth. The highlight of his season came in January when he won the Commercialbank Qatar Masters on the European Tour by shooting a final-round 61.

• This week, Phil Mickelson is making his fourth career start at the Shell Houston Open. He missed the cut in his first appearance in 1995, tied for 30th in 1998 and tied for 28th in 2003.

• Fred Couples, the recently named 2009 U.S. Presidents Cup captain, played in his first Shell Houston Open in 1981. That year he missed the cut but has made it to the weekend in his last 14 appearances -- including most recently in 2004, when he tied for 49th.

• Should Couples make the cut this week he'll move into a tie for second place on the tournament's consecutive-cuts-made list, with Jimmy Demaret still the leader, with 17. Couples has four top-10 finishes in the tournament, including his victory in 2003.

• Australia's Adam Scott became the fourth consecutive international winner of the Shell Houston Open with his 2007 win. Scott joined fellow Aussie Stuart Appleby (2006) and Fiji's Vijay Singh (2004-05) as international champions. Players from outside the U.S. have won seven out of the last nine events, dating to 1999.

• The only American winners in that time are Fred Couples in 2003 and Hal Sutton in 2001. Overall, the Shell Houston Open has had 12 international champions, winning a total of 16 tournaments.

• Adam Scott earned his fifth official PGA TOUR victory at the 2007 Shell Houston Open in his 95th start on TOUR. Scott was 26 years, 8 months, 16 days at the time of his win, making him the youngest winner of the Shell Houston Open since David Duval in 1998, who won at 26 years, 5 months, 24 days. Corey Pavin, who won in 1984 at 24 years, 4 months, 13 days, is the event's youngest winner.

• Adam Scott played the final 36 holes of last year's event without a bogey, including a 48-foot par-saving putt on the 72nd hole.

• In contention all week in 2007, Bubba Watson was attempting to become only the second lefthander to win the Shell Houston Open. Watson eventually tied for second, three strokes behind winner Adam Scott. New Zealand's Bob Charles won the Houston Classic in 1963, which also gave him the distinction of being the first lefthander to win a PGA TOUR event.

• The last time a winner of the Shell Houston Open shot a better final-round score than Adam Scott's 66 a year ago at Redstone Golf Club's Tournament Course was in 1998 when David Duval had a final-round, 8-under 64 at TPC Woodlands. Duval went on to defeat Jeff Maggert by one stroke. While Scott made up a three-stroke deficit going into the final day in 2007, Duval was six strokes behind with 18 holes to play.

• The top 11 positions in the FedExCup points standings remain unchanged after last week's Zurich Classic of New Orleans. Tiger Woods still leads. But two players made big jumps to get into contention in the season-long points chase. Andres Romero, who won in New Orleans for his first PGA TOUR title, moved from 135th to 14th place with his victory, while Peter Lonard, the runner-up in New Orleans, improved 83 places, to 24th place.

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