DALLAS (AP) — Oregon wide receiver Darren Carrington and running back Ayele Ford will not play in Monday’s national championship game after positive NCAA drug tests, coach Mark Helfrich said Saturday.
Carrington did not travel with the team to Dallas after testing positive for pot. The results of Ford’s test were not immediately clear.
Helfrich said the team has faced many issues during the season, including injuries. But he insisted that the team is not distracted heading into the first College Football Playoff title game.
“How you manage those things is what matters most. And our guys have managed all those situations very, very well,” Helfrich said.
Not having Carrington leaves the Ducks down two key wide receivers against Ohio State. Carrington, a 6-foot-2, 191-pound redshirt freshman, had seven catches for 166 yards and two touchdowns in Oregon’s Rose Bowl victory over Florida State.
Ford played in all 14 games this season, with three carries for 17 yards. He had a carry for five yards in the Pac-12 championship against Arizona.
Last week Oregon lost redshirt freshman receiver Devon Allen on the opening kickoff with a knee injury. Allen had 41 catches for 684 yards and seven touchdowns.
The Ducks have also been playing for the last four games without star tight end Pharoah Brown, who went down with a season-ending leg injury against Utah.
That leaves Oregon, which regularly uses three- and four-receiver formations, with Byron Marshall (66 catches for 834 yards), Dwayne Stafford (39 for 578), Keanon Lowe (25 for 359) and freshman Charles Nelson (11 for 101) to rely on at wideout.
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Associated Press College Football Writer Ralph D. Russo and AP Sports Writer Stephen Hawkins contributed to this report.
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