The state of California has issued a new restriction on public activity that will have an effect on the Pac-12 football schedule.
Dr. Erica Pan, California's acting state public health officer, issued a limited stay-at-home order that limits all counties in Tier One of the state's covid hotspot map to a 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. curfew. The curfew began Saturday and runs through Dec. 21.
The order applies to all counties in the purple tier, which as you can see here, includes most of the state. Purple is the state's highest tier, with more than more than seven new cases per 100,000 residents per day and more than 8.0 percent positive tests.
Therefore, as the State Public Health Officer, I am issuing a Limited Stay at Home order, effective in counties under Tier One (Purple) of California's Blueprint for a Safer Economy, requiring that all gatherings with members of other households and all activities conducted outside the residence, lodging, or temporary accommodation with members of other households cease between 10:00pm PST and 5:00am PST, except for those activities associated with the operation, maintenance, or usage of critical infrastructure[1] or required by law. This order does not apply to persons experiencing homelessness. Nothing in this order prevents any number of persons from the same household from leaving their residence, lodging, or temporary accommodation, as long as they do not engage in any interaction with (or otherwise gather with) any number of persons from any other household, except as specifically permitted herein.
Purple counties include Los Angeles (USC, UCLA), Santa Clara (Stanford, San Jose State), and Alameda (Cal), as well as Fresno and San Diego counties.
According to ESPN's Kyle Bonagura, college football games are not exempt from the 10 p.m. curfew.
Here are the remaining home dates for each California team. Local kick times are included where applicable.
Friday, Nov. 27
Cal at Stanford -- 1 p.m.
Saturday, Nov. 28
Colorado at USC -- 12:30 p.m.
Arizona at UCLA -- 5 p.m.
Friday, Dec. 4
Washington State at USC -- 6 p.m.
Saturday, Dec. 5
Hawaii at San Jose State -- 1 p.m.
Colorado State at San Diego State -- 7:30 p.m.
Oregon at Cal -- TBD
Friday, Dec. 11
Nevada at San Jose State -- 7 p.m.
Saturday, Dec. 12
USC at UCLA -- TBD
Oregon State at Stanford -- TBD
At a glance, Arizona-UCLA, Washington State-USC, Colorado State-San Diego State and Nevada-San Jose State are in conflict with this new order, depending on how technical California chooses to be in enforcing the rule.
For instance, Arizona-UCLA will certainly end by 10 p.m., same for Washington State-USC. But there's no chance all players, coaches, media, etc., are shut in their homes by 10 p.m.
Also, the Pac-12 Championship is set for a Friday night kickoff and air nationally on Fox at a campus site. Chances are Fox isn't too interested in airing a game that kicks at, say, 4 p.m. local time on a Friday afternoon, so we'll have to see what becomes of that depending on who hosts.
In the meantime, stay tuned to The Scoop for the latest.