National Basketball Players Association approves NBA’s 22-team return-to-play format

The NBA and NBPA will work through several details on the resumption of this season and establish a date for the start of the next.

Furkan Korkmaz (right) Joel Embiid (left), Ben Simmons and the Sixers are set to resume the season on July 31.Read moreYONG KIM / Staff Photographer

by Keith Pompey

Published Jun. 5, 2020, 6:39 p.m. ET

As expected, the National Basketball Players Association representatives approved the NBA’s 22-team format to restart the season on July 31 at Disney’s ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando.

The league and the NBPA will work through several details on the resumption of the season. Both sides will also negotiate a start date for the 2020-21 season. Right now, the league wants to start training camps on Nov. 10, four weeks after the last possible day of this season’s NBA Finals. The start of the ’20-21 season is scheduled for Dec. 1. However, referring to the training-camp date, NBPA executive director Michele Roberts told ESPN, “I was surprised to see it.”

The representatives were told Friday of a plan to keep a maximum of 1,600 people in the “campus-like” environment, a source confirmed. A limit of three family members, with some exceptions, will be permitted to stay with players at the start of the second round of the playoffs.

Players will be tested for COVID-19 daily. Games will be continued to be played if a player tests positive. However, that player would have to spend a minimum of seven days in quarantine, according to The Athletic.

The format will consist of eight regular-season games per team, a possible play-in tournament for the eighth seed, and postseason play.

The participating teams will include the 16 team currently in playoff spots along with the Eastern Conference’s Washington Wizards and Western Conference’s Portland Trail Blazers, New Orleans Pelicans, Sacramento Kings, San Antonio Spurs, and Phoenix Suns.

The 76ers (39-26) are the sixth seed in the East.