Pac-12 ath­let­ic direc­tors are tar­get­ing Oct. 31 as the pre­ferred start of the foot­ball sea­son, pend­ing approval from the pres­i­dents and sub­ject to the eas­ing of local health restric­tions, accord­ing to con­fer­ence sources.

“It might be a chal­lenge, but many of us would like to play then,” said a source famil­iar with the decision-making.

“We think it’s possible.”

That date would place the con­fer­ence one week behind the Big Ten but give the Pac-12 cham­pi­on eight total games and pos­si­bly open a path to be con­sid­ered for the Col­lege Foot­ball Playoff.

There are three obsta­cles to the sea­son begin­ning on Hal­loween, sources said:

— Nav­i­gat­ing the last batch of local health restrictions

— Gain­ing con­sen­sus on the train­ing camp schedule

— Approval from the CEOs

The pres­i­dents and chan­cel­lors are gath­er­ing Fri­day for a meet­ing that was sched­uled pri­or to the momen­tous devel­op­ments Wednes­day.

Bas­ket­ball was the orig­i­nal focal point, but the foot­ball restart will be dis­cussed in depth with a pos­si­ble vote on a date to begin the season.

Once that date is set — if a date is set — the train­ing camp cal­en­dar will be established.

“They have to des­ig­nate that they’re going to have a sea­son and pick a start date before every­thing else can be for­mal­ized,” a source said.

The con­fer­ence med­ical advi­sors believe play­ers need six weeks of prepa­ra­tion, with a two-week ramp peri­od fol­lowed by four weeks of full-con­tact train­ing camp and practice.

There is some dis­cus­sion with­in the con­fer­ence about short­en­ing the peri­od of prepa­ra­tion to five weeks.

How­ev­er, sev­er­al sources expect the pres­i­dents to lean on the med­ical advi­sors for guid­ance, point­ing to a total of six weeks.

Cru­cial­ly, the ramp peri­od could begin before the dai­ly anti­gen test­ing pro­grams are up and run­ning, accord­ing to sources. That would help accel­er­ate the start of camp and the reg­u­lar season.

How­ev­er, each team must meet the test­ing stan­dards estab­lished by local health author­i­ties — stan­dards based on the preva­lence of the virus in the community.

(Some teams might have to test dai­ly; oth­ers might be required to test once a week.)

The PCR tests that have been in use through the off­sea­son, and have a 24-to-48 hour turn­around time, would be used dur­ing the ramp period.

Full con­tact work — the heart of the prepa­ra­tion — would not begin until the dai­ly anti­gen tests are avail­able at the end of the month.

The time­line could require the pres­i­dents to solve a poten­tial­ly vex­ing issue:

Will they allow each team to begin the two-week ramp peri­od when ready, or stip­u­late that every­one move for­ward collectively?

The Los Ange­les schools have received the clear­ance they need to prac­tice, but the Bay Area schools are still work­ing with their authorities.

For the sea­son to begin Oct. 31 and teams to have a full two-week ramp and four weeks of con­tact, the pres­i­dents would need to approve the restart on Friday.

Mul­ti­ple sources indi­cat­ed con­tin­gen­cies could be includ­ed with any deci­sion, based on the lift­ing of health restrictions.

In oth­er words, even a vote to restart could include some ambiguity.

Whether they aim for Oct. 31 or Nov. 7 — the most like­ly dates, by far — the sched­ule itself must be craft­ed around a Dec. 19 cham­pi­onship game.

Six or sev­en games?

A bye week or straight through?

How will cross-divi­sion oppo­nents be deter­mined? Will com­pet­i­tive equi­ty be considered?

“That’s where the rub­ber is going to meet the road,” a source said. “The ADs just want to play and not get caught up in equity.”

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