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The Canadian Press - ONLINE EDITION

NLL says player's positive test by CCES is not a league matter

By: The Canadian Press

Wednesday, Mar. 13, 2013 at 4:19 PM | Comments: 0

NEW YORK, N.Y. - The National Lacrosse League says a recent positive drug test by Washington Stealth forward Lewis Ratcliff is "not an NLL matter."

The Canadian Centre for Ethics in Sport announced Wednesday that a test administered last year revealed three banned substances.

The organization has banned him from competition for two years "with any sport signatory to the Canadian Anti-Doping Program."

But the NLL said in a statement that the result doesn't apply to the league as it was conducted outside the parameters of its collective bargaining agreement.

"The NLL's policy on performance-enhancing drug use is governed by the collective bargaining agreement with the Professional Lacrosse Players Association," the statement read. "Any testing conducted by any other entity is outside the scope of the CBA and is not an NLL matter."

The CCES said in that Ratcliff's urine sample collected during in-competition doping control revealed the presence of oxandrolone and clenbuterol, two prohibited anabolic agents, as well as oxycodone, a prohibited narcotic.

The test took place on Sept. 12, when Ratcliff was representing the Langley Thunder at the Mann Cup national championship.

The CCES says Ratcliff waived his right to hearing and accepted the two-year sanction, which ends Nov. 9, 2014.

The NLL's drug policy says players will not be subjected to more than one random drug test per season, but a team can have a player examined by a physician not employed by the club in the case of reasonable suspicion of drug use. That physician can then recommend that the player is subjected to a drug test.

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