There's just one week in the season, so it's time to get you caught up on the playoff picture.

Football season is right around the corner, folks. August 21, the first night of high school football, can't get here soon enough. With that date in mind, let's break down each of the 2009 opening night games in the Tri-Nine Conference, which adds Holly Springs to the mix this year.

While our area men's teams are losing a ton of seniors, almost every area girls team returns just about everybody. In fact, only two of the 12 players named to the Tri-Eight All-Conference teams will graduate (Cary's Kelsey Campbell and Athens Drive's Alyx Ingram). In some ways, next year's girls basketball teams will resemble the competition that we saw this year from the boys. There's one clear frontrunner (Apex) but a number of talented squads with a chance to go deep next postseason.

Real quickly, here is how I think our teams will finish next season. You never know what will happen with high schools though. Kids move in, kids move away, kids get reassigned or they just quit the sport altogether. But let's just say for sake of conversation that everything remains the same. Here is how I think they'll finish in their respective conferences: