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Dos Santos pulled from UFC 215 due to potential doping violation

Antonio Bronic / REUTERS

Former UFC heavyweight champion Junior dos Santos has been flagged for a potential violation of the USADA's anti-doping policy stemming from an out-of-competition sample collected on Aug. 10, the promotion announced Friday.

As a result, Dos Santos has been pulled from his date with Francis Ngannou at UFC 215, and the promotion is seeking a replacement for the matchup. The Brazilian's team has since denied that he's knowingly resorted to any performance-enhancing substances in a statement obtained by MMAjunkie.

"We are still trying to understand the test results, so that we can investigate and determine what happened,” the statement read. "What we know as of now is that Junior Dos Santos has never taken PEDs, has never knowingly used any banned substances, and has always supported USADA’s policies and efforts to keep the sport clean. If ever there was a fighter who made his position on this issue unequivocal, it’s Junior. We are confident that that we will be able to figure out what happened, and will provide an explanation once we have one."

The surging Ngannou wasted no time in expressing his chagrin at seeing what would have marked the stiffest test of his UFC career fall through just three weeks out.

The anti-doping agency is currently in the "results management" stage of Dos Santos' case, and has not yet revealed the nature of the potential violation.

Dos Santos has alternated wins and losses over his last eight fights, and would have ventured to Edmonton, Alberta, looking to rebound from a first-round knockout loss to reigning champion Stipe Miocic suffered in their May rematch at UFC 211.

UFC 215 - scheduled for Sept. 9 at Rogers Place - will be headlined by a pair of title fights. Demetrious Johnson is set to defend his flyweight crown against Ray Borg in the main event, with women's bantamweight champion Amanda Nunes meeting challenger Valentina Shevchenko for the second time in the co-headliner.

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