After an almost five-month hiatus, the 2019-20 NBA season is set to resume from the Disney World bubble on Thursday. The first game back will be the Pelicans vs. the Jazz at 6:30 p.m. ET, followed by the Lakers and Clippers at 9 p.m. ET. There will be six more games on Friday, and with that, we'll be off and running. This continues to be a fingers-crossed situation, but so far the NBA's bubble plan appears to be working as well as anyone could've hoped.
Each of the 22 teams in Orlando will play eight "seeding" games that will constitute the close of the regular season, at which point the top seven playoff seeds in each conference will be locked. As for the No. 8 seeds, if the No. 9 seed is within four games in the standings at the conclusion of the eight seeding games, there will be a playoff for the final spot, with the No. 9 seed having to beat the No. 8 seed twice.
Once the playoffs start, it will be business as usual: four rounds, seven-game series. If all goes well, the NBA Finals will conclude within the first two weeks of October.
