For the season, the Raptors played a shortened 72-game season, as the season start was delayed until December. The Raptors needed a temporary home arena as a result of travel restrictions placed by the Canadian government due to the COVID-19 pandemic. On November 20, the Raptors announced that they would be beginning the 2020–21 season at Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida, (the home of the National Hockey League's Tampa Bay Lightning); they also considered the Bridgestone Arena in Nashville (home of the Nashville Predators), the KeyBank Center in Buffalo (home of the Buffalo Sabres), the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City, the Prudential Center in Newark (home of the New Jersey Devils), or the KFC Yum! Center in Louisville (home of the Louisville Cardinals). This would be the first season since 1995 (prior to the expansion of the Raptors and Vancouver Grizzlies) not to have NBA regular-season games played in Canada following the Raptors' announcement on February 11, 2021 that they will finish the 2020–21 season in Tampa, as a result of further border restrictions. It was also the first time since 2007 an NBA team has been temporarily displaced from their home city since the New Orleans Hornets were relocated to Oklahoma City due to the damage inflicted by Hurricane Katrina on stadiums in 2005.