UFC Fight Night 264 Live Winners and Losers
Well, they can't all be international pay-per-view shows, can they?
The UFC took a precipitous step down, both in venue and star power, with a 13-bout card from the Apex in Las Vegas that featured precisely six ranked fighters from top to bottom after last week's two-title-fight card in Abu Dhabi.
Featherweights Steve Garcia and David Onama got main-event treatment as the Nos. 12 and 13 fighters, respectively, at 145 pounds. Garcia had won six in a row and seven of nine with the company since a Contender Series debut in 2019, while Onama was on a four-fight heater and was 6-2 overall since arriving in 2021.
In the co-main slot was a match of ranked heavyweights Waldo Cortes-Acosta (No. 6) and Ante Delija (No. 9), and fighting on the prelim show were third-ranked Ketlen Vieira and No. 4 Norma Dumont in a women's showdown at bantamweight.
The B/R combat team was in place to take in all the action and delivered a real-time list of the event's definitive winners and losers. Take a look at what we came up with and drop a thought of your own in the app comments.
Winner: Leveling Up
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Alex Volkanovski already had myriad options for compelling title defenses at featherweight, but now he has another.
Garcia punched his ticket to the 145-pound big time with a career-best performance in the main-event spotlight, pursuing Onama with relentless aggression before landing the flurry that ended things at 3:34 of the first.
It was a seventh consecutive victory for the 33-year-old, who referenced the dream he had as a teenager to reach the UFC and change his life.
"I had a prayer when I was 15 years old and today was one of my answers," he said. "I asked God to make me somebody, and I told him I'd do the work."
Six of the seven wins on his streak have come by finish, and he said his plan had always been to make Onama another statistic. He now has 15 KOs in 19 career wins, including eight in the first round.
"My dad told me to be violent in here, so that's what he got," Garcia said. "I don't get paid by the hour. I get paid by the minute."
Winner: Resilient Retribution
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Vengeance is mine, sayeth Cortes-Acosta.
The sixth-ranked heavyweight, seconds after he was nearly finished by an inadvertent eye poke, rejoined the fray and landed a counter right hand that dumped Delija to his back and did end matters at 3:59 of the first round.
Delija appeared to have won at 3:30 of the first when he began a flurry with a poke to Cortes-Acosta's left eye and threw several more punches that prompted an intervention from referee Mark Smith. Delija ran to his corner and celebrated with teammates, but Smith quickly clarified that he had not actually ended the fight but was instead calling time to check a replay.
Cortes-Acosta was given five minutes to recover and indicated he could continue, just seven days after a title fight between Tom Aspinall and Cyril Gane was stopped and declared a no-contest after Aspinall could not.
Delija pressed the action and walked into the right hand that sent him tumbling backward to the floor and preceded a flurry of ground shots that brought Smith's official wave-off and gave Cortes-Acosta his eighth UFC win.
"I was mad. I'm Dominican. It's in my blood," he said. "Even when people come in here in shape, I f**k them up."
Loser: Keeping House
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Though he'd won 14 of 19 overall and four of six in the UFC, Themba Gorimbo is still best known as the guy who got a house from Dwayne Johnson.
And given his last two results, that may not change anytime soon.
The 34-year-old won four of his first five octagonal fights but hasn't had it quite as good over the last 12 months, dropping his second straight on Saturday via unanimous decision to Philadelphia-based welterweight Jeremiah Wells.
Gorimbo started quickly and had Wells in a perilous position in the opening round while landing a series of ground strikes, but the 39-year-old rallied with aggression and takedowns over the final 10 minutes and earned 29-28 tallies on all three scorecards—matching the B/R count.
Gorimbo had been finished in 52 seconds by Vicente Luque in his last fight on the UFC 310 undercard last December, while Wells improved to 5-2 in the UFC and ended a two-fight skid in his first appearance since February 2024.
Winner: Persistent Punishment
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If at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
Or, in Yadier del Valle's case, try about two dozen more times.
The "Cuban Problem" was the only unbeaten fighter on the main show and performed like it, getting featherweight foe Isaac Dulgarian to the ground and chasing a rear-naked choke for several minutes before finally getting his man to give up at 3:41 of the first.
It was a second straight first-round UFC finish for the 29-year-old, now 10-0 as a pro, who snaked his left arm under Dulgarian's chin and adjusted his grip several times as Dulgarian desperately flailed with punches before finally tapping in surrender.
'I am a black belt in jiu-jitsu. I train with one of the best teams out there," del Valle said. "I knew he was going to try to take me down. And I wasn't worried. I had it and I was going to keep doing it and keep working it until I got my finish."
Winner: Bully Beatdown
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Charles Radtke may never be a champion or even a ranked contender.
But it doesn't mean the fighter known as "Chuck Buffalo" can't look like a bully when he's matched against an opponent at or near his level.
The Chicago-born welterweight had one in front of him for a main-card bout with Daniel Frunza and he treated the Romanian exactly how you'd expect, chasing an early submission and doling out consistent punishment until he came back to secure the rear-naked choke at 4:29 of Round 3.
It was the fourth win in six UFC bouts for the 35-year-old, who ran up career-best numbers in both takedowns (3) and control time (11:41) while bouncing back from a TKO loss to Mike Malott in a pay-per-view prelim in May.
"In terms of putting together a dominant performance and showing evolution," analyst Daniel Cormier said, "this was it for Charles Radtke."
Winner: Competitive Calm
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Cody Durden, fueled by the adrenaline of taking the fight on 10 days' notice, was a blur of aggressive, punching activity in the opening five minutes.
But it was sound and fury that, ultimately, signified nothing.
The frenetic flyweight walked onto a precise right elbow thrown by Brazilian technician Allan Nascimento, tumbled dizzily to the canvas and soon found himself on the wrong end of the anaconda choke that prompted a surrender at 3:13 of Round 2.
It was a fourth straight win for Nascimento, who praised Durden's toughness and thanked him for accepting the fight, but said finding the choke—taught to him by training teammate Charles Oliveira—was always the objective.
"That is the Chute Boxe (Academy) way," he said. "We stay ready in the storm."
Loser: Unnecessarily Unconscious
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Kevin Christian, to say the least, was unlucky.
The towering light heavyweight, standing a lanky 6'7", was not only dropped with a counter right hand and battered with some follow-up ground strikes by opponent Billy Elekana, but his tapping surrender to a subsequent rear-naked choke was out of the view of referee Chris Togoni.
So Elekana kept his right arm tightly under Christian's chin and eventually put his foe to sleep, prompting Tognoni's technical submission wave-off at 3:33 of the opening round.
Christian was revived soon after and seemed none the worse for wear in the aftermath, but studio analyst Michael Chiesa didn't hold back on Tognoni's error.
"(He) dropped to the wrong side and essentially Christian went out even though he wanted it to be over," Chiesa said. "To miss the tap, you're putting the fighter in harm's way. We can't have that."
Winner: Damage Denial
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Timmy Cuamba's face showed all the damage.
The 26-year-old bantamweight was nicked alongside the left eye and leaking badly from the nose and mouth, but by the time the second round of his scrap with ChangHo Lee had ended, it was clear whose cardio was winning.
Five minutes later, it was game, set and match.
Cuamba spent the first round wearing Lee like a backpack but took full advantage of the Korean's depleted gas tank across the final session—intermittently chasing his neck while smothering him from tap to horn to secure a unanimous decision with matching 29-28 scores.
The B/R scorecard agreed, also giving Cuamba the second and third rounds as he evened his official UFC slate at 2-2 since a Contender Series win in 2023.
Lee lost for the first time in the promotion after two octagonal victories had followed a pair of wins on the Asian-based Road to UFC series.
Winner: Toolbox Transition
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Donte Johnson was a new man, figuratively and literally.
The heavyweight-turned-light heavyweight turned into a middleweight for his prelim match with six-fight UFC veteran Sedriques Dumas, and he apparently decided to change his style to go along with his physique.
Having won each of six previous fights by first-round KOs, Johnson eschewed the standup for a bit of wrestling and made it work for him, taking Dumas three times before submitting him with a guillotine at 1:25 of the second.
It was his first trip past the first round and only the third time in seven fights that he's gone beyond 90 seconds to get a victory.
"When I came in, I said 'Jesus take the wheel. So what you want with me,' and I guess that's what he had in mind," Johnson said. "We got (wrestling) in the toolbox as well."
Loser: Curious Contenders
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The women's bantamweight division is in some flux, creating competitive opportunity for the contenders in hot pursuit of Kayla Harrison, whose reign atop the 135-pound ranks has barely entered a fifth month.
And given their standings as the third- and fourth-ranked fighters in the division, prelim opponents Ketlen Vieira and Norma Dumont were positioned to become the focal point of the "who's next?" discussion.
Somehow, though, neither did.
Oh sure, Dumont escaped and extended her win streak to six with what seemed a ridiculous split-decision victory, but being taken down in each of the first two rounds and nearly submitted in the first was hardly fuel for a belief that she can beat the two-time Olympic judo gold medalist.
In fact, the B/R card had Vieira a 29-28 winner thanks to the takedowns and the near-finish with the arm triangle, mirroring one official card but being overruled by two 29-28 nods in Dumont's direction—which left Vieira's coaches in a frenzy in the immediate aftermath.
"I guess I'll have to go back and re-watch it," analyst Michael Bisping said. "I'm not surprised (Vieira's coaches) are a little pissed off."
Winner: Urgent Uptick
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Two of Saturday's first three fights involved women trying to make career-changing statements in the strawweight division.
Toward that end, it's safe to suggest Talita Alencar was the big winner.
The 35-year-old Brazilian was both on the final fight of her UFC contract and in need of a full-time gig to maintain an employment visa, and her urgency was apparent in a rear-naked choke submission of Ariane Carnelossi.
Alencar got her countrywoman to the mat in each of three rounds and secured the finish with 24 seconds to go after unsuccessfully chasing it late in the second. It was the fourth submission in seven career wins but first in the UFC, where's she's now won in three of four appearances.
Alice Ardelean was a wide decision winner over Montserrat Conejo Ruiz in the other bout at 115 pounds, evening her octagonal record at 2-2.
"It feels amazing. I'm finally here," Alencar said. "I wanted to make a statement tonight and I did. I'm very grateful."
Loser: Converting Confidence
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He'd spent a summer spent wrestling alongside teens at a Daniel Cormier mat camp and he had former two-time boxing title challenger Andre Dirrell in his corner—not to mention huge physical edges in both height and reach.
So, it wasn't surprising that Phil Rowe entered his welterweight bout with Korean import Seokhyeon Ko flushed with confidence that he'd be able to handle himself regardless of how it transpired.
Well, so much for that.
Rowe's edges on the feet and improvements on the mat were never a factor as Ko scored takedowns in each of three rounds and racked up better than 13 minutes of control time on the way to a shutout victory on all three scorecards.
One judge, in fact, gave Ko a 10-8 edge in one of the rounds, allowing him to improve to 2-0 in the octagon after a Contender Series win, while Rowe dipped to .500 at 4-4 since his own triumphant Contender Series debut.
Full Card Results
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Main Card
Steve Garcia def. David Onama by TKO (punches), 3:34, Round 1
Waldo Cortes-Acosta def. Ante Delija by TKO (punch), 3:59, Round 1
Jeremiah Wells def. Themba Gorimbo by unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
Yadier del Valle def. Isaac Dulgarian by submission (rear-naked choke), 3:41, Round 1
Charles Radtke def. Daniel Frunza by submission (rear-naked choke), 4:29, Round 3
Allan Nascimento def. Cody Durden by submission (anaconda choke), 3:33, Round 2
Preliminary Card
Billy Elekana def. Kevin Christian by technical submission (rear-naked choke), 3:13, Round 1
Timmy Cuamba def. ChangHo Lee by unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
Donte Johnson def. Sedriques Dumas by submission (guillotine choke), 1:25, Round 2
Norma Dumont def. Ketlen Vieira by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
Alice Ardelean def. Montserrat Conejo Ruiz by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)
Seokhyeon Ko def. Phil Rowe by unanimous decision (30-26, 30-27, 30-27)
Talita Alencar def. Ariane Carnelossi by submission (rear-naked choke), 4:36, Round 3
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