Utah Utes lose two safeties to injury in loss to Oregon Ducks

SANTA CLARA, Calif. — Besides the loss to Oregon on the scoreboard Friday night at Levi’s Stadium, the Utes suffered some big individual losses on the field as well.

Senior safety Julian Blackmon, one of the mainstays of the vaunted Utah defense all season, went down with a leg injury early in the second quarter and didn’t return.

Then his replacement, sophomore R.J. Hubert, went out with an injury midway through the third quarter and was replaced by Nephi Sewell, who had played sparingly this season, for the rest of the game.

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When asked afterward if Blackmon’s injury was serious, coach Kyle Whittingham replied, “Appears to be. Also R.J. Hubert. That’s a shame. Both first and second free safety. Looks like it may be significant. We will let you know next week.”

The other starting safety, Terrell Burgess, was upset about his fellow safeties going down.

“It’s tough,” he said. “You never want to see somebody go down. In this program, we teach ‘next man up.’ Sewell came in. We tried to do what we could with what we had, just tried to play football.”