The BC Football Conference hopes it can begin a 2021 season right after Labour Day

Photo: Wayne Moore/file

After more than a year of uncertainty, the BC Football Conference and other amateur and junior sports leagues are starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel.

For the BCFC, that light could include a 2021 season.

League president Tyler McLaren is optimistic after the province introduced its four phase reopening plan late last month.

"We are working toward a start around Labour Day. That's the target after they [provincial health office] released the guidelines and the stages and the phases," McLaren told Castanet News.

"After the Sept. 7 date everything can kind of return somewhat to normal, assuming we stay on the right course."

McLaren says an abbreviated eight-game schedule with games beginning in early September has been drawn up, but he indicates that won't be released officially until likely the middle of next month.

An early- to mid-September start would also mean a regular season rolling through to the end of October. With playoffs going well into November, McLaren says that could require the national championship game being pushed into December instead of early November.

Those discussions at a national level, he says, still have to take place.

As for the six teams in the BCFC, McLaren says everyone has made it through the pandemic in reasonably good financial shape. Everyone knows about grant programs available and how to access them.

"They just want to play football," he said.

Teams are allowed to practice in some form now. McLaren expects, if all goes well, that teams will ramp up practices in the coming weeks in anticipation of some form of training camp later in August.