Las Vegas, NV – April 13: (LR) Brazil’s Alex Pereira knocks out Jamahal Hill at UFC Lite… [+] Heavyweight Championship fight during the UFC 300 event at T-Mobile Arena on April 13, 2024 in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC via Getty Images)
Zuffa LLC (via Getty Images)
UFC 300 is a fight card that begins with a curtain-raiser between two former UFC champions and ends with two title fights (and one iconic title fight) that delivers everything it promised and more. Ta.
Early qualifying featured a bloody battle between Bobby Greene and Jim Miller, two veterans of over 100 professional MMA contests. In the preliminaries, former PFL champion Kayla Harrison scored an impressive victory over former UFC champion Holly Holm in her UFC debut. And on the main card, Bo Niccal remains undefeated, Arman Tsarukyan continues his rise up the lightweight rankings, Max Holloway delivers a legend-shaking performance to win the BMF title, and Weili Zhang takes the semi-main title. He retained the UFC strawweight belt at the event. Alex Pereira retained his UFC light heavyweight title with a knockout victory in the main event of UFC 300.
In short, UFC 300 was a memorable night filled with excitement and action.
UFC 300 took place on Saturday, April 13th at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The main card was streamed on ESPN+ pay-per-view following prelims on ESPN and early prelims on ESPN+.
Below, we take a look at the winners and losers of the UFC 300 fight card.
winner
Alex Pereira: UFC light heavyweight champion Alex Pereira showed his power is on another level as he finished former champion Jamahal Hill in 3 minutes, 14 seconds in the first round of the main event of UFC 300 was shown. With this victory, Pereira defended the title he won in November. He won by TKO over Jiri Prochaska in 2023. In three UFC light heavyweight bouts, Pereira defeated three former UFC 205-pound titleholders.
Zhang Weili vs. Yang Xiaonan: In the first UFC Championship fight between two Chinese fighters, Zhang Weili and Yang Xiaonan put on a memorable matchup, with the champion being the overall better fighter than the challenger. It was shown that Xiaonan did a good job with her striking, especially on the counter, but it was Weili’s grappling skills that made the difference in the match.
Weili retained his title with a 49-45×3 decision win in the co-main event of the night.
Max Holloway: Max Holloway moved up to lightweight at UFC 300 and won the (iconic) BMF title with a face lock on Justin Gaethje with one second left in the fifth round, the most of his Hall of Fame career. He gave a memorable performance. round war.
Holloway’s boxing skills were too much for Gaethje. He controlled the pace and scope of the fight, eating into every heavy leg kick Gaethje threw. There was also a spinning back kick that appeared to break Gaethje’s nose in the final seconds of the first round.
Holloway’s performance would have been notable even without the last-second knockout, but getting the stoppage at that point gives Holloway’s performance at UFC 300 legendary status in that sense. pushed up.
Justin Gaethje: Justin Gaethje had a good 4:59 in the first round, landing some heavy low kicks, but after Max Holloway landed a roundhouse kick to Gaethje’s nose at the end of the first round. , the tide of the battle changed.
Gaethje struggled to find range for his punches in the next two rounds, but found an opening in the fourth stanza.
Gaethje showed toughness and heart, but Holloway’s boxing skills were too much for him in the fifth round.
Arman Tsarukyan: Until Saturday night, Arman Tsarukyan had never faced a submission attempt as a member of the UFC roster. He put that to bed early in the first round of his bout with Charles Oliveira at UFC 300, when Tsarukyan successfully executed a deep guillotine choke to upset the former UFC lightweight titleholder.
What really stood out about Tsarukyan’s approach was his calmness in the face of danger. Despite Oliveira’s aggressive guard, Tsarukyan did not succumb to frustration. Instead, he patiently waited for an opening late in the round to land a slicing elbow that cut the former champion.
Tsarukyan did a great job of controlling things on his feet throughout the fight, fighting through four submissions. In the end, the matchup between the two elite lightweights was a close one, but Tsarukyan won by split decision. With the win, the up-and-coming 155-pounder, who is on a four-fight win streak, could earn a rematch with current UFC lightweight champion Islam Makhachev. The two faced off in 2019 in Tsarukyan’s UFC debut.Makhachev won the bout by unanimous decision.
Charles Oliveira: Former UFC lightweight champion Charles Oliveira came close to finishing off Arman Tsarukian early in the first round, but then he stopped, except in the final 30 seconds when he landed another choke. Tsarukyan dominated most of the match.
Although Oliveira lost the match by a close split decision, the setback caused the former champion to drop significantly in the standings, as Oliveira put in a great performance and never gave up, as evidenced by his choke attempt late in the match. I don’t think that will happen. End of the third section.
Bo Knickal: Bo Knickal wasn’t satisfied with his performance against Cody Brundage, which he won by submission in the second round. His three-time NCAA wrestling champion puts too much pressure on himself, which can be good or bad.
Nickal doesn’t have much MMA experience – he reached 6-0 after UFC 300 – but he deserves attention and will only get better with time.
Jiri Prochaska: Light heavyweight bout against Aleksandar Rakic Despite sustaining severe leg damage in the first round of his match, Prochaska was in control for most of the first round. He had no respect for Rakić’s striking, and that disrespect paid off in the second round, setting up a striking match for which Rakić was not ready, and Prochazka ending the fight with a strike.
I’m not sure how well Prochaska’s no-defense approach would work against stronger strikers, but it worked for me at UFC 300.
Aljamain Sterling: Aljamain Sterling moved up to featherweight and dominated No. 8 ranked Calvin Kattar, posting eight takedowns and a control time of 10:43. However, he never did much damage or picked up any submission attempts during the fight. Even if Sterling were to step up and aim for a title shot right away, that won’t happen after UFC 300. That being said, Sterling did the same thing in his UFC featherweight debut, using his ground game to get the win.
Kayla Harrison: The hardest thing Kayla Harrison had to deal with at UFC 300 was reaching the bantamweight limit. The former PFL lightweight champion did just that on Friday, checking in at 136 pounds. On Saturday, Harrison ran over former UFC bantamweight champion Holly Holm and dominated every phase of the fight.
It will be interesting to see what Holm does next under the UFC banner, as Harrison easily dispatched Holm, finishing him with a rear-naked choke in the second round and only landing two significant strikes. However, there is a possibility that he will win the UFC title. mix.
Diego Lopez: Diego Lopez released a statement on Saturday. The 29-year-old Brazilian knocked down Sodiq Yousaf twice with two right uppercuts before finishing him off with ground strikes in the first round. En route to the knockout, Lopez limited Yousaf to two significant blows.
This victory marks Lopez’s third consecutive victory.
Yousaf entered the fight ranked No. 14 in the UFC’s official rankings. Expect Lopez to be included in the updated rankings after UFC 300.
Renato Moicano: Renato Moicano didn’t have much ground control in the first round of his match against Jalyn Turner. However, things changed in the second round when he got a takedown and ended the match with a ground strike.
With the win, Moicano achieved three straight wins for the first time in his UFC career after opening the promotion with a 3-0 record between 2014 and 2017.
Bobby Green: On Saturday, Bobby Green put together one of the best performances of his long MMA career, dominating Jim Miller for an intense 15 minutes at UFC 300. Green separated Miller with a steady diet of jabs, leaving him bloodied as he landed. 186 significant strikes to Miller’s 57.
Deiveson Figueiredo: Deiveson Figueiredo looked calm and confident but wasn’t very busy during the first five minutes of his 135-pound fight against Cody Garbrandt. The former flyweight champion seemed to mostly downplay Garbrandt’s power, which became more apparent early in the second round as he survived several heavy-hitting attempts to get takedowns. Ta.
The takedown allowed Figueiredo to lock in an arm triangle with significant time left in the round, but he was unable to force Garbrandt to tap. Garbrandt remained very calm during the submission attempt. However, Figueiredo never relinquished control on the mat and later secured a rear naked choke when Garbrandt tried to get off his back.
Figueiredo appeared to have an impressive victory over the former 135-pound champion.
With his win at UFC 300, the former UFC flyweight champion improves to 2-0 at 135 pounds.
UFC 300 Fighters: UFC Matchmaker has put together cards stacked on paper. The fighters then did their part to provide a great night of fights on Saturday.
UFC: The graphics, the old intro “Face the Pain,” the throwback videos the production team created for the event, everything made UFC 300 special. The UFC production team stepped up for this event, and their efforts couldn’t go unrecognized.
loser
Cody Brundage: It seemed like Cody Brundage’s game plan was to survive and wait for his chance. He didn’t survive and Beau Nickal didn’t give him a chance.
Aleksandar Rakic: Rakic used a lot of low leg kicks early on to slow down former UFC light heavyweight champion Jiri Prochaska. This approach worked well, as Prochaska was bothered by that kick, but it didn’t stop Prochaska from trying to move forward, which proved to be Rakic’s undoing.
Calvin Kattar: Calvin Kattar had nothing to offer Aljamain Sterling. Qatar, who was ranked 8th in the UFC featherweight rankings heading into UFC 300, is expected to drop down in the rankings.
Qatar is currently undefeated with 1 win and 4 losses in 3 matches dating back to 2021.
Holly Holm: Holly Holm appeared to make a mistake in the first round by clinching with Kayla Harrison. Things weren’t going well for her throughout the fight.
Sodiq Yousaf: Sodiq Yousaf’s run as a ranked UFC featherweight fighter likely ended with a first-round knockout of Diego Lopez on Saturday. The loss marked the 30-year-old’s second straight loss after starting his promotion campaign with a record of 6 wins and 1 loss.
Jalin Turner: Jalin Turner dropped Moicano late in that stanza, but referee Herb Dean, thinking he would wave the fight off, allowed Moicano to get back up. A stoppage was not guaranteed if Turner followed his opponent to the mat, but it could have happened. Instead, Moicano ended the match with a ground strike in the second round.
Jim Miller: On Saturday, Jim Miller became the only fighter to compete in UFC 100, UFC 200 and UFC 300. He fought with a lot of heart and guts, but Bobby Green overwhelmed him in a bloody battle in Game 2. night.
Cody Garbrandt: Cody Garbrandt entered UFC 300 on a two-fight win streak. The former UFC bantamweight champion lost his third straight title as he bowed out to Deiveson Figueiredo late in the second round.
On the positive side, Garbrandt looked good in the first round when the fight stood up, but once the fight got to the mat, Garbrandt had nothing to offer Figueiredo.
Fans who weren’t in their seats for Opening Day: I understand the concept of being fashionably late. I even think some of the events the UFC has been putting on lately aren’t all that deep, so to speak, but UFC 300 wasn’t one of those events. For all fans who purchased tickets, there was no excuse not to take a seat for the opening round of UFC 300.
