Canadian Football League
The regular season is 21 weeks long, with games beginning in mid-June and finishing by early November. The CFL's nine current teams are divided into two divisions: the East Division with four teams and the West Division, with five teams. Each team plays two games against each of the other eight teams, plus two divisional games with opponents rotating each season. With 18 regular season games being played, each team gets three bye weeks.
United States Football League
There were plans to establish four franchises in Canada prior to the inaugural season, located in Vancouver, Edmonton, Montreal and Southern Ontario (specifically at Ivor Wynne Stadium in Hamilton, Ontario). The proposal was pushed by John F. Bassett, the Canadian who would go on to own the Tampa Bay Bandits USFL team. However, Senator Keith Davey warned that the Canadian government would act to protect the Canadian Football League from competition. The Canadian Football Act had been proposed, but not approved, when Basset had tried to establish the Toronto Northmen in the World Football League in 1974. Such legislation would have banned US football leagues from playing in Canada. In particular, Montreal's CFL team, the Concordes, was on precarious financial ground, having just been established to replace the recently folded Alouettes. This led Bassett to drop the idea.