When Will NBA, NHL, MLS, MLB, Premier League & More Come Back? Updated Return Dates for Every Sport

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Author: Scott T. Miller

Jeenah Moon/Getty Images. Pictured: NBA league offices

When Will Sports Return? The Latest News…

Friday, June 12: The NBA is bumping up its return date by one day, moving it to July 30, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and The Athletic’s Shams Charania.

Shams also reported the following details on dates for the NBA’s return to play:

July 30-Aug. 14: Seeding games
Aug. 15-16: Play-in game(s)
Aug. 17: Playoffs begin
Aug. 30: Family/guests of teams arrive
Aug. 31-Sept. 13: Conf. Semifinals
Sept. 15-Sept. 28: Conf. Finals
Sept. 30-Oct. 13: NBA Finals

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This news coincided with reports that players, most notably the Nets’ Kyrie Irving, are “raising concerns over the NBA’s bubble plan,” according to Bleacher Report’s Howard Beck. BR’s Taylor Rooks first reported the following:

“I’ve spoken to multiple players, about 5 days ago there was a zoom call of about 50 players discussing what they can do to take a stand. They are planning another call tonight with about 150 players to solidify what that stand is and stress this only works if they unify.”

The league has given no indication that it’s wavering from the plan it laid out on June 4, which involves 22 of the league’s 30 teams playing inside a bubble environment in Orlando. The 22 teams will be the 16 currently in the playoffs plus the Pelicans, Blazers, Suns, Kings, Spurs and Wizards.

Thursday, June 11: The 24 NHL teams still alive in the league’s revised playoff format will report to training camp on July 10. The league did not announce any other dates, saying, “The length of training camp and, therefore, the start date for formal resumption of play will be determined at a future date.”

Wednesday, June 10: The MLS officially announced its plans for a tournament, starting on July 8, to restart its season. The event, which the league is calling the “MLS Is Back Tournament,” will run from July 8 to Aug. 11 and take place at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports complex in Orlando. All 26 MLS teams will be involved.

The tournament will be set up in a similar way to the World Cup, meaning there will be a group stage, before whittling down the field to a Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals and Championship.

The 26 teams were placed into six different groups via a random drawing that took place on June 11. Teams will begin arriving in Orlando on June 24, with games beginning two weeks later.

The 39 group stage games will count toward the regular season standings. The league said it plans to resume the regular season in its teams’ home markets after the tournament is completed, but no further details were provided.

Estimated Return Dates for the NBA, MLB, NHL, Tennis, Soccer & More

Current as of June 12 at 2 p.m. ET. Any dates below are estimates on when each sport could return, based on statements from each league and/or news reports. We’ll run through them one by one below in chronological order.

League	Return Date	Status
Premier League	June 17	Estimate
Serie A	June 20	Date Set
Belmont Stakes	June 20	Rescheduled Date
MLS	July 8	Date Set
European Tour	July 22	Rescheduled Date
LPGA	July 23	Rescheduled Date
NBA	July 30	Date Set
PGA Championship	Aug. 6-9	Rescheduled Date
FedEx Cup Playoffs	Aug. 13-Sept. 7	Rescheduled Date
Indy 500	Aug. 23	Rescheduled Date
CFB Week 0	Aug. 29	No Date Change Yet
Tour de France	Aug. 29-Sept. 20	Rescheduled Date
U.S. Open (tennis)	Aug. 31-Sept. 13	No Date Change Yet
CFB Week 1	Sept. 5	No Date Change Yet
Kentucky Derby	Sept. 5	Rescheduled Date
NFL Opening Game	Sept. 10	No Date Change Yet
NFL Opening Sunday	Sept. 13	No Date Change Yet
U.S. Open (golf)	Sept. 17-20	No Date Change Yet
French Open	Sept. 20-Oct. 4	Rescheduled Date
Ryder Cup	Sept. 25-27	Date Set
Preakness Stakes	Oct. 3	Rescheduled Date
Wilder-Fury III	Early October	Estimate
Breeders’ Cup	Nov. 6-7	No Date Change Yet
Masters	Nov. 12-15	Rescheduled Date
NHL	TBD	Postponed
MLB Opening Day	TBD	Postponed
Champions League	TBD	Postponed
Europa League	TBD	Postponed
CFL	TBD	Postponed
ATP & WTA	TBD	Postponed
WNBA	TBD	Postponed
Formula 1	TBD	Postponed
Tokyo Olympics	N/A	Canceled
British Open	N/A	Canceled
Wimbledon	N/A	Canceled
Euro 2020	N/A	Canceled
Copa America	N/A	Canceled
XFL	N/A	Canceled

English Premier League Return Date

We’ve had some fits and starts, but it appears the English Premier League will make its return on June 17, according to multiple reports. While the UK government still needs to approve the league’s plans, that’s considered a formality, since it had already given the EPL clearance to come back after June 1.

According to the BBC, the EPL will open with Aston Villa vs. Sheffield United and Manchester City vs. Arsenal on June 17, with a full slate of matches to be played over the weekend on June 19-21.

Serie A Return Date

Serie A, Italy’s top soccer league, will start back up just a few days after the EPL, on June 20, according to James Horncastle of The Athletic.

Belmont Stakes Date

The Belmont is staying in June, moving from June 6 to June 20. It will big the first leg of the Triple Crown for the first time ever, and as a result, the race will be shorter (1⅛ miles, as opposed to the usual 1½ miles).

MLS Return Date

The MLS officially announced its plans for a tournament, starting on July 8, to restart its season. The event, which the league is calling the “MLS Is Back Tournament,” will run from July 8 to Aug. 11 and take place at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports complex in Orlando. All 26 MLS teams will be involved.

The tournament will be set up in a similar way to the World Cup, meaning there will be a group stage, before whittling down the field to a Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals and Championship.

The 26 teams were placed into six different groups via a random drawing that took place on June 11. Teams will begin arriving in Orlando on June 24, with games beginning two weeks later.

European Tour Return Date

After months of staying quiet on a return date, the European Tour released its plan for getting back on the course. The Tour will come back on July 22 with the Betfred British Masters at Close House Golf Club. These five events will follow the British Masters:

July 30-Aug. 2: English Open
Aug. 6-9: English Championship
Aug. 13-16: Celtic Classic
Aug. 20-23: Wales Open
Aug 27-30: UK Championship

LPGA Return Date

The LPGA will return on July 23 at the Marathon Classic in Sylvania, Ohio.

NBA Return Date

The NBA is bumping up its return date by one day, moving it to July 30, according to ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski and The Athletic’s Shams Charania.

Shams also reported the following details on dates for the NBA’s return to play:

July 30-Aug. 14: Seeding games
Aug. 15-16: Play-in game(s)
Aug. 17: Playoffs begin
Aug. 30: Family/guests of teams arrive
Aug. 31-Sept. 13: Conf. Semifinals
Sept. 15-Sept. 28: Conf. Finals
Sept. 30-Oct. 13: NBA Finals

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“I’ve spoken to multiple players, about 5 days ago there was a zoom call of about 50 players discussing what they can do to take a stand. They are planning another call tonight with about 150 players to solidify what that stand is and stress this only works if they unify.”

Indy 500 Date

The Indy 500 has officially been moved from Memorial Day Weekend (May 24) to Sunday, Aug. 23.

College Football Start Date

ESPN’s Adam Schefter, who’s certainly plugged into all levels of football, reported on April 9 that there’s “strong conviction” among college football decision-makers that we’ll have a 2020 season. The start time is uncertain, but, Schefter reported, “they sound certain there still will be college football this season.”

Tour de France Date

The Tour de France, which had been postponed from its original June 27 start date, will now take place from Aug. 29-Sept. 20.

US Open (Tennis) Date

The US Open tennis major, which typically takes place in late August/early September in New York City, might be moving West this year. Nothing is official yet, but with NYC being the epicenter for the conoravirus outbreak in the U.S., officials are starting to look into contingency plans, which would include moving the event to November and staging it in California, at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden.

Inside Tennis spoke with USTA executive director Michael Dowse, who said, “Nothing is off the table.” He added the following:

“There’s too much speculation – we’ll know so much more in June. In reality it’s certainly possible to play without fans. No formal decision has been made about Indian Wells. Whatever we do, we’ll have to do it in alignment with the owners of Indian Wells, and the ATP and the WTA.”

Dowse’s comments seem to verify a previous report from The New York Times that we can expect a decision from the USTA on the fate of the 2020 US Open some time in June.

The Telegraph said that the USTA is “absolutely desperate to stage the event,” adding that it makes approximately $400 million in revenue for the association.

ATP chairman Andrea Gaudenzi said, “The USTA is planning to push the US Open back if the situation doesn’t improve before the summer.” (Unlike Wimbledon, the US Open does not have pandemic insurance, so it will not outright cancel the event until the last possible moment.)

Kentucky Derby Date

The Kentucky Derby was originally slated for the first weekend in May, but it’s been rescheduled for Sept. 5, which is also currently expected to be the first full college football Saturday.

NFL Start Date

According to the Sports Business Journal, the NFL is actively working on back-up plans should the league be unable to start on Sept. 10.

The NFL is set to reveal its regular schedule in May, and as part of that exercise it’s building in the potential that it might not be able to start until mid-October. SBJ reports that if the season can’t start until then, the NFL would still play a 16-game schedule, but there would be no bye weeks, the Super Bowl would move from Feb. 7 to Feb. 28 and the bye week between the conference championship games and the Super Bowl would be spiked.

ESPN’s Kevin Seifert had previously reported that multiple NFL execs plan to start the season on time. Per executive vice president/general counsel Jeff Pash said during a media briefing, “All of our focus, has been on a normal, traditional season, starting on time, playing in front of fans, in our regular stadiums, and going through a full 16-game regular season and a full set of playoffs.”

Preakness Date

The Preakness is rescheduled for Oct. 3. It will follow the Kentucky Derby and be the final leg of the Triple Crown. It had previously been slated for May 16.

Wilder-Fury III Date

The third heavyweight battle between Tyson Fury and Deontay Wilder will have to wait. Top Rank chairman Bob Arum told ESPN that the much-anticipated rematch, which was scheduled to take place on July 18 at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, will likely be rescheduled for “early October.”

Postponed Events/Leagues With No Date Provided

NHL Return Date

NHL teams will report to training camp on July 10. The league did not announce any other dates, saying, “The length of training camp and, therefore, the start date for formal resumption of play will be determined at a future date.”

Whenever the league does resume playing games, it will go straight to the playoffs, which will feature 24 teams, eight more than the usual 16. Each conference will be assigned a hub city for the playoffs. The bottom eight qualifying teams in each conference will play a best-of-5 series to get into the playoffs, and the top four seeds will play in a round robin to determine seeding.

MLB Opening Day Date

MLB owners officially approved a plan that would see baseball start in early July … if they can agree to a deal with the players union. That seems far from certain, based on the reporting of ESPN’s Jeff Passan, who outlined the hurdles to reaching an agreement here.

Champions League & Europa League Return Date

UEFA announced that it’s suspending the Champions League and Europa League indefinitely. UEFA also suspended Euro 2020 qualifying playoffs and international friendlies that were set to take place in June. Earlier this week, UEFA president Aleksander Ceferin warned that the entire season could be lost. “Nobody knows when the pandemic will end,” Ceferin told La Repubblica. “We have a Plan A, B or C: to restart in mid-May, in June or at the end of June.”

UEFA presidents also sent a letter to its leagues and clubs saying that canceling their respective seasons should be viewed as a “last resort.”

CFL Start Date

The Canadian Football League announced on April 7 that it would not start until at least July 1. The regular season was supposed to kickoff on June 11.

ATP & WTA Return Date

The ATP and WTA will both remain suspended through at least Aug. 3, according to a report from the New York Times’ Christopher Clarey. The Telegraph has previously report that, “Privately, both the ATP and WTA tours know that a complete wipeout of the 2020 season is probably a more realistic outcome than a late-summer restart.”

Given the international nature of tennis’ player base and its events, the sport is proving tougher to restart than others, even though it has natural social distancing built into the game.

WNBA Start Date

The WNBA, which had been slated to start its 2020 season on May 15, announced that it will be postponing the start of training camp (and thus, its season) until further notice. The league did not give an estimate on when camp could begin.

Formula 1 Start Date

F1 postponed the Canadian Grand Prix, which was slated to take place on June 14. F1 is working on a larger revised schedule with all races now canceled or postponed through June 14.

Canceled Seasons/Events

Summer Olympics Reschedule Date

The 2020 Tokyo Olympics will no longer take place this summer. They might not even take place this year, as the International Olympic Committee and officials from Tokyo officially postponed the Games on Tuesday morning.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said that the IOC “100%” agreed to postponing the Games until the Summer of 2021, though a release from the IOC didn’t quite go that far, saying the latest the Games “must be rescheduled to a date beyond 2020 but not later than Summer 2021.”

British Open (Canceled)

The British Open has officially been canceled. The R&A reportedly has pandemic insurance, which meant the organization had to make a decision soon on whether to cancel if it wanted to collect on that insurance. Royal St. George, which was slated to host this year’s event, will now play host in 2021, The 2022 event, which will be the 150th playing of The Open, will take place at St. Andrews.

Wimbledon (Canceled)

The All England Lawn Tennis Club officially canceled 2020 Wimbledon on Wednesday, April 1, marking the first time since World War II that the event will not be held.

The AELTC had previously stated that it did not want to play the event without crowds, so it really had three options: 1) Play with crowds at the original date, June 29 to July 12; 2) Postpone to when crowds can be safely present; or 3) Cancel the event altogether. The AELTC chose Option 3.

The USTA — which runs the US Open (set to take place in New York from Aug. 31 to Sept. 13 — released a statement on Wednesday saying it still plans to host the US Open “at this time.”

Euro 2020 Rescheduled Date

UEFA has postponed Euro 2020 until the summer of 2021.

Copa America Rescheduled Date

Much like Euro 2020, Copa America has been postponed a full year until the summer of 2021.

XFL (Canceled)

The XFL officially canceled its season on March 20. A few weeks later, the upstart football league fired all of its employees and said it has no plans to return in 2021, a quick reversal to their March 20 statement saying that it was “looking forward to playing full seasons for you — and with you — in 2021 and beyond.”

Monaco Grand Prix (Canceled)

Formula 1 canceled the Monaco Grand Prix, which is probably the biggest motorsports event in the world each year. The race was supposed to take place over Memorial Day Weekend. It will mark the first time since 1954 that the Monaco Grand Prix does not take place.