On July 20, 2020 the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) and North Coast Section (NCS) released the sports calendar for the 2020-2021 season, Due to the pandemic, the seasons were shortened and pushed back later into the academic year.
Following the announcements by the CIF and NCS, the East Bay Athletic League (EBAL) Board of Governors met on Thursday, July 23rd to review and modify its league schedule accordingly. For 2020-2021 only, the league will be divided by County lines, with the Alameda County schools (Dublin, Amador Valley, Foothill, Granada, and Livermore) playing each other in an 8-game double round-robin schedule while the Contra Costa schools (California, Dougherty Valley, San Ramon Valley, Monte Vista, Carondelet/De La Salle) follow suit.
The decision to shorten the league schedule was made primarily due to health considerations (i.e. limiting the number of contacts, keeping schools primarily within county jurisdictions with their own health regulations, etc.). Other factors for shortening the schedule included the compressed calendars and more limited time-frame to conduct most sports seasons, the high volume of overlap of sports (i.e. 14 spring sports that also include some fall overlap), logistical concerns related to facility usage, limits on the ability of athletic training staffs to provide adequate care, the need to place some limits on the amount of people on campus at any one time, and administrative constraints related to supervision of so many simultaneous events.
The EBAL has made a request to the NCS that the 2 champions of the respective divisions receive automatic berths in postseason competition and both be considered “league champions.” it is yet to be determined whether that will be granted, or whether a championship contest between the winners of the 2 County divisions will need to be played to determine the official EBAL champion and NCS automatic qualifier. Once a decision is rendered it will be announced.
The entire 2020-2021 EBAL schedule for all sports can be viewed on the EBAL website at www.theebal.com.
