Sadly, for lacrosse and soccer teams, they will not get to have their seasons. They are both considered high risk sports. Some other high risk sports include volleyball, field hockey, and wrestling. There are some sports that can still continue in a social distancing way, such as cross country, mountain biking, swimming, diving, track and field, and golf.

The VHSL has indicated that only the low-risk and medium-risk sports will be played in phase 3. The restrictions for high-risk sports have not stopped the private schools from playing their sports. Some private schools have said that they are going to be playing their football season and other high-risk sports in the fall.

College football is finally back, or is it? Covid-19 has deeply affected the NCAA, stopping March Madness, and other spring sports in the middle of the season. During this pandemic, fans all around the world are asking the same question, will there be college football this year? Right now, conferences such as the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC), Big 12, Big 10, and Southeastern Conference (SEC) are going to play this year, so 4 of the 5 major conferences will be playing this season. However, some conferences are still undecided about football this fall, like the last major conference, the Pac-12.

Although most conferences are playing football this season, the Ivy League will not be one of them. They have canceled all fall sports this year, including football. The Ivy League presidents stated that “With the information available to us today regarding the continued spread of the virus, we simply do not believe we can create and maintain an environment for an intercollegiate athletic competition that meets our requirements for safety and acceptable levels of risk,” therefore canceling all sports this season. The Ivy League was the first collegiate body to state that they were not going to compete this year in sports. The Pac-12 also said that they would cancel their season because they didn't feel that they had the access to rapid COVID-19 tests to safely carry out a season, but now with the progress that America had made with COVID, there is still a chance that the Pac-12 could be returning to football sometime this season.

Many conferences have decided that they were going to play, but the Big-10 was not going to be one of them. On August 11th the Big-10 canceled football for the 2020 season, Many Big-10 fans and players were really disappointed that they weren’t going to play or watch this year, but as of Tuesday, September 14, the Big-10 officially announced that they will play football this year. Conferences such as the ACC have had several teams already play, but the long-awaited UVA vs. VT Commonwealth Cup rematch was postponed until September 19, and then postponed again until December 12. Another question that many fans around the world are asking, will there be people at games? As of right now, few people are allowed to come to the games. Many colleges for right now are having around 20-25% of fans in the stadium. Fewer people in the stands will greatly affect the home-field advantage because there won’t be much noise in the stadium.

Some conferences that canceled their 2020-2021 fall season, were considering playing football this Spring. This is unlikely to happen for several reasons, first of all, it is extremely hard to be a college athlete, and to be asked to play not one, but two seasons would be incredibly difficult. Also, NFL bound athletes would probably opt the spring season out to avoid the risk of being injured. Another question is, how will this affect the player’s eligibility if their season is canceled? Right now the NCAA Division one Council has decided that players will receive another year of eligibility if their season is canceled. So that way it wouldn’t hurt a player too much if their season is canceled. All in all, football will be different this year, whether it's because your favorite team isn’t playing, or you can’t go to the games, at least there will be some college football this year.

Tom Brady to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Cam Newton to the New England Patriots. Philip Rivers to the Indianapolis Colts. And that’s just the quarterbacks.

The 2020 NFL free agency was wild. With Tom Brady signing a two year $50 million contract with the Bucs, to Cam Newton signing a one year $8.5 million contract with the Patriots, to all the moves in between

The most surprising move was Cam’s move from the Panthers to the Patriots. After a 15-1 record and a loss in Super Bowl 50 to the Broncos, Cam suffered numerous injuries and played less and less. The Panthers eventually decided to cut him in 2019, leading him to join the Patriots in early 2020. He had an excellent first game against the Miami Dolphins with two rushing touchdowns, which is not seen a lot (except in Baltimore). My take is that Cam will be the Patriots QB until the Pats find a more suitable replacement for Brady, because we all knew Jarret Stidham had heart, but he did not have the passing ability to make it to a starting position.

Philip Rivers had a somewhat decent game, throwing for 363 yards and a touchdown, but is this move really for him? Last year he had one of his best seasons yet, ending the 2019 season with an 88.5 overall QB rating. Not great, but not as bad as Will Grier, who was the Panthers replacement for Cam after he was released. It’s probably too early to tell, but the Colts might be what Philip Rivers needed to become another Dak Prescott.

Brady. Where to start? He left the Patriots with six rings, his last pass as a Patriot being a pick. And he decided to go south. WAY south. To Tampa Bay, Florida. Why Tampa Bay, I don’t know. He could have gone anywhere. Everyone except the Ravens and Chiefs wanted him. I, as a Patriots fan, realized after they got knocked out of the wild card round, that that was Brady’s last game. After that, I focused on the other games, and eventually, the Chiefs beat the 49er’s in Super Bowl 54. So I wasn’t surprised when I opened my phone and saw that everyone was talking about Brady’s move to the Bucs. He played OK last Sunday against the Saints, but not good enough to say his move to Tampa was worth it. He was a system QB who could only win with the help of Bill Belichick, which is why in my opinion, Brady moved from a Super Bowl contender to just another 8-8 team.

The NFL free agency was a crazy one, and I can’t wait to see how the season plays out.

You might be asking yourself, “How is the NFL season even affected by this pandemic? ” well I have some answers for you. By the looks of it, the Coronavirus is here to stay. That means that there might be some big and small impacts on the NFL season. While COVID-19 has been in positive directions over the past weeks, there is a chance of outbreaks worldwide. That means that the NFL season could be shortened or even canceled. Another thing people are thinking about is playoff bubbles. NFL vice president of football operations Troy Vincent says he is all in. At the state of COVID-19 right now will likely dictate the NFL's course of action.

On March 11th, 2020, in the later stages of the NBA’s season, teams were starting to get ready for the playoffs. Then their season was stopped short by the Coronavirus. Utah Jazz player Rudy Gobert tested positive for the virus and all games were postponed for that day, and eventually the rest of the season. Other players started testing positive and it seemed hopeless that the NBA would return. But then in June, 3 months later, some coaches proposed an idea to the commissioner of the NBA, Adam Silver. The concept was called a “bubble.” Pretty much, the teams that were still in playoff contention, which were 22 out of the 30 NBA teams, traveled to Disney World to finish the season. Yes, Disney World. In Orlando Florida, they have a sports complex with multiple basketball courts and a few hotels. The players would have every-other-day tests and would not be allowed to leave the campus, hence the name “bubble.”

The bubble has been a huge success so far, with no COVID-19 positive tests in the entire 3 months they’ve been there. No family was allowed to come into the bubble until recently. The players were completely isolated with only their teammates, coaches, and a few workers, like cooks to be with in person. The bubble guidelines have been very strict. One player was accused of breaking bubble restrictions and he was suspended from playing for two weeks.

The stadiums in the bubble are completely fan-free and are surrounded by screens broadcasting virtual fans cheering their favorite teams on. On different team websites, fans can sign-up for a chance at being a virtual fan during one of the games. The only people allowed in the stadiums are players, media, security, and team personnel. When the home team scores a point or makes a stop on defense, the stadium's speakers will play a cheering noise or a cool sound effect to imitate a normal NBA basketball environment. This is good for the away teams, but not so much for the home teams, because the home teams don’t really have a home-court advantage. For example, the Lakers played their hardest for the whole beginning of the year before the bubble to get a great spot in the playoffs, and a home-court advantage. But they didn’t realize they would be getting cheered on through a screen and playing on the other side of the U.S.

In the bubble, the season was shortened a little bit and also games were played much more frequently. Instead of finishing the 20 or so games that were missed, they shortened the end of the season to just 8 games. Also, most teams would normally play 2-3 times a week, but in the bubble, teams play every other day because they don't have to travel more than a few hundred yards from their hotel. After those 8 games, the playoff brackets were set.

The Milwaukee Bucks finished as the best team in the league. For the NBA playoffs, there are two conferences with 15 teams each, East and West. Within those conferences, there are 8 teams that make it to the playoffs. The East seeds went: 1. Milwaukee, 2. Toronto, 3. Boston, 4. Indiana, 5. Miami, 6. Philadelphia, 7. Brooklyn and 8. Orlando. The bracket is 1 vs 8, 2 vs 7, 3 vs 6, and 4 vs 5. The teams play up to seven games in a series. Whichever team wins four games first, wins the series

EAST Playoffs

EAST 1st round results:

1. Milwaukee beat 8. Orlando (4-1)

2. Toronto beat 7. Brooklyn (4-1)

3. Boston beat 6. Philadelphia (4-0)

5. Miami beat 4. Indiana (4-0)

No surprises there. Although Miami was the lower seed, they were seen as the better team against Indiana. This set the East for some matchups, which both ended in surprises.

EAST Semi-finals

5. Miami beat 1. Milwaukee (4-1)

3. Boston beat 2. Toronto (4-3)

Maybe the biggest surprise of the bubble, Miami beat Milwaukee 4-1 in the series. Milwaukee was the favorite to win the title and was considered the best team in the NBA this year. Miami was just a horrible matchup for them. Toronto losing to Boston seems surprising on paper, but the Celtics are packed with stars and seemed like the better team throughout the season. This set up an interesting Conference finals between Miami and Boston.

EAST Finals

5. Miami Heat beats 3. Boston (4-2)

The Miami heat jumped out to a commanding 3-1 lead in this series, and ended up winning 4-2. The Heat were again underdogs in this series, but pulled it out in six games. Three out of their four wins in this series were won after losing by a decent amount in the fourth quarter. In games one and two they were down by 14 and 12 with less than ten minutes to play, but ended up coming back to win both of those games. In game six, they were down by 6 with about 7 minutes left, and then outscored Boston 35-17 and ended up winning by 12.

WEST Playoffs:

As for the west, the two LA teams led their conference at the 1 and 2 seeds for the west. After really close contention for the 8 seed, the Portland Trail Blazers came up with it. The seeds were: 1. LA Lakers, 2. LA Clippers 3. Denver, 4. Houston, 5. Oklahoma City, 6. Utah, 7. Dallas, 8. Portland.

WEST First round:

1. LA Lakers beat 8. Portland (4-1)

2. LA Clippers beat 7. Dallas (4-2)

3. Denver beat 6. Utah (4-3)

4. Houston beats 5. OKC (4-3)

The 3-seeded Denver Nuggets were down 3-1 in the series but came roaring back to win 4-3. Otherwise, things were smooth sailing for the rest of the higher seeds.

WEST Semi-Finals

1. LA Lakers beat 4. Houston (4-1)

3. Denver beat w. LA Clippers (4-3)

James Harden and the Houston Rockets won the first game against Lebron James and the top-seeded Lakers but then dropped the next four. Denver came back from down 3-1 against the Clippers. They did the same thing vs the Jazz in their first-round matchup. This is the first time a team has ever come back from down 3-1 twice in the same postseason. Since 1968, only 11 teams have done it ever, and Denver did it twice in the same postseason. The LA Lakers are the heavy favorites in the WEST Finals but, Denver player Jamal Murray says that his team: “Needs some respect!”

WEST Finals

1. LA Lakers beat 3. Denver (4-1)

While both teams were coming off a hot streak, the Lakers closed out the series and advanced to the NBA Finals. The Nuggets played their best but couldn’t close it out and lost 4-1.

NBA FINALS:

5. Miami plays 1. LA Lakers (0-0)

With the Finals set to debut on September 30th, not many teams and people remain on campus. As soon as your team loses, you're kicked out of the bubble. Both teams' players have been here since July 7th, almost three months in total isolation. Only in Mid-September were the players allowed to see their families or friends, but that is only allowed to be 2-4 people. This series extends a crazy streak in the NBA. In 36 straight NBA Finals, there has been a player who played with Shaquille O’Neal at one point or another. Also, this is the first time in NBA history that the two teams that made the NBA Finals consisted of two teams who didn’t even make the playoffs in the previous year. The Heat and Lakers both won all of their series in commanding ways, so this should be very interesting.

THIS ARTICLE WAS FINISHED ON OCTOBER 1ST. AT THE TIME, THE NBA HAD NOT FINISHED ITS SEASON BUT THE FINALS WERE SET. WE PREDICTED THE FINALS INSTEAD OF REVIEWING THEM BECAUSE OF THIS.

Predictions:

Aaron: Miami beats the LA Lakers (4-2)

The Heat have been red-hot in these playoffs, no pun intended. They are 11-3 overall before the Finals and have made quick work of all the teams they've played thus far. I think they’ll stay hot and take their fourth NBA championship for the franchise. I think the key to this series is if Miami’s All-Star center Bam Adebayo can slow down the Lakers big-man Anthony Davis. The Heat also need Jimmy Butler to become the team leader he was supposed to be. During the series against Boston, rookie Tyler Hero proved he can be a go to player. In game 5, he went off for 37 points and 8 assists. If the Lakers want to win this series, they need their two best players, Lebron James and Anthony Davis to play well, but I think they need support players like Alex Curoso and Rajon Rondo to step up and make big plays. This will be really fun to watch because it’s the Miami Heat’s first NBA finals appearance since 2014 when Lebron led them there. Although it’s been 6 years, there still might be some tension between the Heat and Lebron, probably making both teams play harder and more aggressive. I think that the Heat win the championship in 6 games

Brendan: LA Lakers beat Miami (4-2)

The Lakers ended their quarterfinal and semifinal matchups in less than 6 games, and have had the longest break in the playoffs so far. This will help their odds of winning the Finals, with Lebron well-rested. The Heat on the other hand have been unstoppable through the playoffs. While the Heat have been playing out of their minds, the Lakers are the better overall team and should wrap up the series in 6 games.