Pandemic Issues Force Huskies to Bow Out of Pac-12 Title Game

That didn't last long.

The Pac-12 Conference announced on Monday that the University of Washington football team has pulled out of the league championship game against USC because of pandemic issues and been replaced by Oregon.

The Huskies and Trojans were set to play on Friday night at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum with a 5 p.m. kickoff.

However, the UW continues to battle a COVID-19 outbreak that has decimated its roster over the past week, a situation that previously forced it to back out of a road game at Oregon last Saturday.

"We have zero offensive linemen," UW coach Jimmy Lake said. "Our whole team is in isolation. We couldn't play football last week and we can't play football this week."

The Huskies, who have appeared in four home games and gone 3-1, hope to compete in a bowl game. They will need two consecutive days of zero positive tests, and will test the team again on Tuesday.

Washington simply wasn't able to come up with 53 scholarship players for the coming championship game or the minimum number of those required for each position area.

"This virus is wicked," Lake said. "It's extremely infectious. We're seeing that now."

The school wouldn't give a total for how many football players have tested positive. Asked if coaches were infected, the team trainer acknowledged that staff members had been infected by the virus.

Oregon (3-2), as the team with the next-best record, was elevated to face USC for the title.

Earlier, Arizona and California canceled its season-ending football game for next weekend.

The Huskies, after two conference restarts, were originally pegged to play seven league games. The opener against California was cancelled, as was the Apple Cup against Washington State, the road game at Oregon and now the title game against USC. The UW was only able to add an Arizona game to its schedule.

In hindsight, Lake said an earlier conference start would have permitted Pac-12 teams to make up many of the game cancellations it lost.

Prior to the Stanford game the week before, the Huskies had dealt only with single positive cases. That changed markedly over the past 10-11 days.

The UW coach said his team would need 3-4 practices to get ready for a bowl game, with the first postseason game becoming available on Dec. 29.

"We have to get healthy and accomplish the second part of our goal, which is win a bowl game," Lake said.

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