DALLAS — Oregon wide receiver Darren Carrington, who had 14 catches for 292 yards and three touchdowns in the Ducks’ last two games, is suspended for the national championship game.
Team spokesman Andy McNamara confirmed Friday that Carrington is not with the team as it prepares for Ohio State on Monday, but McNamara would not indicate why.
Carrington, a 6-foot-2-inch, 191-pound redshirt freshman, made his first career start in the victory over Arizona in the Pac-12 championship game, finishing with seven catches for 126 yards and a touchdown. He added seven catches for 166 yards and two TDs in Oregon’s Rose Bowl victory over Florida State on Jan. 1.
Not having Carrington leaves the Ducks down two key wide receivers against Ohio State.
Last week Oregon lost redshirt freshman Devon Allen on the opening kickoff with a knee injury. Allen had 41 catches for 684 yards and seven touchdowns.
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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.
Tight end Evan Baylis had a breakout game last week with six catches.
Playoff to stay at 4 teams
DALLAS — There has been no discussion among the group that runs the college football playoff about adding more teams.
College Football Playoff executive director Bill Hancock said Friday there were plenty of reasons why a four-team model was picked, and nothing has changed that after the first of a 12-year contract.
“We know we were able to keep the regular season and keep the bowls, keep the experience and the tradition of the bowls,” Hancock said. “So this worked out really, really well. We couldn’t be happier.”
Larger brackets were toyed with when the playoff concept was first being put together. But some things are preventing an expansion: notably, more travel for teams and fans and the locations for extra games.
As for the committee selecting the teams, there could be fewer meetings and rankings next season, though those will still be in person. That committee gathered seven times in six weeks this season at a hotel near the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. The group put out its initial ranking in late October, and the final one in December.
“With a shorter season, I think it will be pretty easy to lop off one week, and we might knock another one off,” Hancock said, noting there are 14 weeks, instead of 15, between season openers and conference championship games next season.
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