UFC Fight Night 254: Live Winners and Losers, Results

There are big cards. And then there are super cards.

Saturday's UFC show from the Apex facility in Las Vegas was neither.

Only three of 26 fighters across 13 bouts had ranking numbers alongside their names, with two of them involved in a main event that pitted ex-middleweight title challenger Marvin Vettori (No. 8) against Roman Dolidze (No. 12) in a rematch of a bout Vettori won by unanimous decision on a pay-per-view show in March 2023.

Vettori, 31, had split four fights since losing to then-champ Israel Adesanya in a five-rounder atop the UFC 263 show in June 2021, while the 36-year-old Dolidze had won two of three since the loss to Vettori, including a first-round KO of Kevin Holland in his most recent bout at UFC 307 last October.

The B/R combat team was in place to take everything in and deliver a definitive, real-time list of the show's winners and losers. Take a look at what we came up with and drop a thought of your own in the app comments.

Familiarity breeds contempt.

Or in the case of Dolidze and Vettori, some competitive tedium.

The second-time foes got together for another match of similar styles and it yielded five rounds of occasional exchanges amid long periods of each man waiting for the other to commit.

Ultimately, it was Dolidze who evened the rivalry score with a unanimous decision via three matching scores of 49-46. The B/R card also had it four rounds to one in Dolidze’s favor.

“It was a big and important test for me,” he said. “Five rounds, hard. I can go five rounds, hard. I was ready. I was controlling my aggression.”

It was all about optics early for the fighter from the republic of Georgia, who was even in significant strikes after both the second (39-39) and third (58-58) rounds, but gave a better vibe because he was the aggressor. It was clearer across the final two rounds, as Dolidze shook off early Vettori flurries in both to be the busier and more effective fighter for the balance.

Vettori’s corner team suggested before the fifth that he needed a stoppage, but he was unable to snap a streak in which he’s never found a finish beyond Round 1 of any fight.

The win will presumably yield a top-10 ranking come Monday for Dolidze, who was quick to call out former champs Adesanya and Robert Whittaker for his next fight. Adesanya is ranked fourth but is 0-3 since April 2023, while Whittaker is ranked fifth but was submitted in one round by Khamzat Chimaev in his most recent appearance last October.

“I deserve a top-five fight,” Dolidze said. “Give me enough time to make weight and I’ll be ready.”

Chidi Njokuani spent the first round entirely on brand, utilizing a five-inch height advantage to keep co-main event foe Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos at a manageable distance.

But once the second round started, he decided to get a bit more violent.

The 6’3” welterweight shifted from sharp-shooting dos Santos with kicks to brutalizing him with knees, including the one that connected with the Brazilian’s chin and started the finishing sequence for a fight that soon ended by TKO at 2:19 of Round 2.

It was Njokuani’s third straight win at 170 pounds and the 25th in a pro career that stretches back to 2007. It was also his first finish since a one-round stoppage of Dusko Todorovic in 2022.

“I came in preparing for a three-round war,” Njokuani said. “I don’t know what the hell I hit him with but it ended the fight early.”

For the record, it was a left knee to the chin that came immediately after a right knee to dos Santos’ body. The one to the chin dropped dos Santos to his back and Njokuani pounced with a series of hard elbows until referee Mark Smith intervened.

“Top 15, baby,” Njokuani said. “I like it. Gimme somebody. Anybody can get it.”

Well, so much for undefeated records.

Kazakh light heavyweight Diyar Nurgozhay was 10-0 and coming off a Dana White’s Contender Series win as he entered the cage Saturday night, and he looked on the way to stretching his streak as he got Brazilian striker Brendson Ribeiro to the ground early in Round 2.

Little did he know, though, it was precisely what his opponent was looking for.

Once horizontal, Ribeiro kept himself out of danger and instantly went on the offensive, seizing Nurgozhay’s right arm and prompting a tap via kimura at 1:28 of the round.

“When my opponent got to the ground,” Ribeiro said, "I thought, ‘OK, I’m going for the finish right now.’”

It was a 17th career victory, a 16th win by finish and a seventh by submission for the 28-year-old “Gorilla,” who’s won two straight since a two-fight skid in the first half of 2024.

“This is nothing but the fruit of all the work we put in as a team,” he said. “This is what happens.”

Da’Mon Blackshear’s record is respectable, not jaw-dropping.

But once the 30-year-old gets you to the mat, he might as well be unbeaten.

Make no mistake, the Miami-based bantamweight was outworked and out-landed, especially early, during a surprisingly competitive first round against veteran underdog Cody Gibson. 

Eventually, though, things started going according to his expectations.  

“I was like, ‘Aw, f–k, I ate too much before the fight. I was just like, ‘OK, let it settle,’” Blackshear said. “I wanted to get my composure and then start to move forward. I thought I was gonna touch him up on the feet and he’d realize he didn’t want it there.”

The plan progressed. 

And soon after things went to the mat, Gibson’s right arm was in a painfully compromising position, leaving surrender by kimura as his only choice at 4:09 of Round 2. 

It was Blackshear’s 11th submission in 16 career wins and boosted his UFC mark to 4-3-1. It was also the first time since UFC 123 in 2010 that two fights on the same show ended by kimura.

“Blackshear weathered the storm and he was able to slowly out-technique Cody Gibson,” analyst Dominick Cruz said. “His black belt won him that fight.”

The youngest fighter on the card was perhaps its most impressive.

Twenty-three-year-old Kevin Vallejos was in tough with a taller, longer 10-fight veteran in his main card curtain-raiser against SeungWoo Choi, but his performance indicated he may ultimately be a fighter who finishes shows rather than opening them.

Showing fundamentals that bely his young age, the Argentine ducked under an overhand right from Choi and countered with one of his own, dumping his foe to the floor along the fence and following with a series of ground shots that forced the hand of referee Kerry Hatley.

The official time was 3:09 of the first, and, by the time Vallejos returned to his feet following a post-fight back flip, analyst Michael Bisping was already singing his praises.

“I’m not at all surprised by that. I was impressed,” Bisping said. “We have a future star on our hands, I’m telling you.”

It was the winner’s 15th triumph in 16 pro fights and gave him a chance to avenge the only loss, which came by decision against Jean Silva in a Dana White’s Contender Series match in September 2023. Silva has won four straight by KO since defeating Vallejos and will meet veteran contender Bryce Mitchell on the UFC 314 show next month in Miami.

Maybe heavyweight isn’t for Ryan Spann after all.

The 6’5” Texas-based jiu-jitsu ace was a stylistic nightmare while running up an 8-5 record in the UFC’s light heavyweight ranks, but he decided a move up the ladder was necessary to reinvigorate a career that had stalled with three losses in his last four fights.

After less than 10 minutes with the 12th-ranked fighter in the big-boy division, though, it might be time for another change of heart.

Spann was still taller and longer than opponent Waldo Cortes-Acosta but clearly not as powerful, and it showed when the 261-pound Dominican flattened him with a left hook on the way to a stoppage with 12 seconds remaining in Round 2.

Already on the wrong end of two low blows and an inadvertent eye poke through the first nine minutes, Spann’s prospects grew dimmer as he tired against his girthier foe. The decisive sequence came as he backed toward the fence, got speared with a hard left jab, and was left vulnerable as Cortes-Acosta quickly followed with the hook that landed flush and sent him tumbling backward.

Another half-dozen strikes followed to prompt referee Smith’s hand and lift Cortes-Acosta to his fourth straight win, which tied him for the longest active streak among the heavyweights.

“Nothing surprised me,” Cortes-Acosta said. “We knew that if he got a lot of pounds on him he wouldn’t have the stamina to get through a whole fight.”

Sometimes, the skill set matters.

Ecuadorian export Carlos Vera had a variety of combat sports credentials, including a black belt in taekwondo, as he climbed the steps to meet UFC newbie Josias Musasa as the show’s biggest betting underdog.

And though Musasa was hyped thanks to an impressive striking performance on Dana White’s Contender Series, it was Vera’s variety that enabled him to pull off the upset and send the folks who backed him at +500 home happy.

The 37-year-old missed an overhand right punch but quickly transitioned into a right-side head kick that landed flush and sent Musasa tumbling to the floor. It was a quick, decisive move from there as Vera leapt in, cinched his left arm around his stricken foe’s neck for a rear-naked choke and smiled broadly when the intervention from referee Herb Dean came at 3:16 of the first.

The win, his 12th in 16 pro fights, was more than enough to prompt happiness, but Vera was even more pleased to encounter analyst Bisping, who’d been a critic of his striking–or absence of it, to be more accurate–in his previous fight 13 months ago.

“We worked really hard on striking, grappling and wrestling, and we were able to execute,” Vera told Bisping. “And because all you said I could do was dance on the floor, I had to show a little bit of a striking arsenal, too.”

Bisping, working his 100th broadcast, took the jab in stride and replied with one, too, as he strolled away to exit the cage.

“Maybe,” he said, “you can thank me if you get the bonus.”

Toughness is a wonderful quality to have.

But if it’s the go-tag for a fighter, it may not be such a good thing.

Spanish flyweight Daniel Barez was certainly brave, courageous and resilient throughout his prelim card matchup with unbeaten Andre Lima, but it was essentially just a nice way of saying he was being decisively beaten on all fronts without providing much offense in return.

The 36-year-old was scraped on the forehead, bleeding from the nose and reddened across the torso and left leg thanks to Lima’s sharpshooting and the Brazilian’s overall quality was ultimately too much to survive, yielding a finish by rear-naked choke at 3:05 of Round 3.

It was Lima’s first career submission win and stamped him as a fighter to watch at 125 pounds. Meanwhile, Barez lost for the second time in three UFC starts after a Dana White’s Contender Series defeat and tapped out for the fourth time in seven career losses.

“(Lima) broke him down and beat him down until he got the submission, which made the submission a little easier to get,” Cruz said. “That’s how you work toward a submission, particularly when the opponent is as tough as Daniel Barez was.”

Maybe Carli Judice was a little bit irritated.

And whether she concedes to it or not, the 26-year-old flyweight certainly fought like it.

Introduced first despite being a betting favorite and having more UFC experience than Yuneisy Duben, Judice had to wait through a highlight package for her unbeaten opponent, too, before referee Smith finally waved them together.

Once that happened, the waiting paid off.

Judice provided a highlight of her own with a classic shin-to-chin knockout, leaving Duben defenseless with a head kick that crashed into the Venezuelan’s jaw and decisively ended the night’s opening fight after exactly 100 seconds.

“She walked straight into the fire. She looked so confident,” Cruz said. “That’s how you make a statement.”

The KO was Judice’s fourth in four career wins and handed Duben her first loss after she’d won six straight, all by finish as well.

“We knew she hadn’t been in there with a striker like me, as skilled as me,” said Judice, who, ironically, trains at the Headkicks MMA gym in Lafayette, La. “Hard work paid off.”

Blow-by-blow man Brendan Fitzgerald delivered the line:

“Zombie Girl turns her opponent into one!”

But it was Priscila Cachoeira who delivered the shot that created it.

The powerful Brazilian bantamweight ripped opponent Josiane Nunes with a hard right uppercut that left her flat on her back at 2:46 of Round 1, ending a two-fight losing streak and clearing the way for an impassioned post-fight plea for a performance bonus.

Nunes had been consistently aggressive from the start but had a fundamental flaw of dropping her head and facing the floor as she plodded forward. Cachoeira spotted the mistake, braced the back of her foe’s head in a partial Thai clinch, then delivered the kill shot per the counsel of her corner team.

It was the first time in UFC history that two consecutive women's bouts ended by KO.

“I trained so much with these guys,” Cachoeira said, “and they told me ‘You’re gonna catch her when she dips her head.’”

It was an eighth KO in 13 career wins for the 36-year-old, an admitted former drug user who requested the bonus to help her open a rehab program in her home country.

“I want to help people and continue to save lives,” Cachoeira said. “Please help me out.”

Main Card

Roman Dolidze def. Marvin Vettori by unanimous decision (49-46, 49-46, 49-46)

Chidi Njokuani def. Elizeu Zaleski dos Santos by TKO (knee), 2:19, Round 2

Alexander Hernandez def. Kurt Holobaugh by unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)

Da'Mon Blackshear def. Cody Gibson by submission (kimura), 4:09, Round 2

Brendson Ribeiro def. Diyar Nurgozhay by submission (kimura), 1:28, Round 2

Kevin Vallejos def. SeungWoo Choi by TKO (punch), 3:09, Round 1

Preliminary Card

Waldo Cortes-Acosta def. Ryan Spann by TKO (punch), 4:48, Round 2

SuYoung You def. AJ Cunningham by unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 30-27)

Carlos Vera def. Josias Musasa by submission (rear-naked choke), 3:16, Round 1

Sam Hughes def. Stephanie Luciano by split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-27)

Andre Lima def. Daniel Barez by submission (rear-naked choke), 3:05, Round 3

Priscila Cachoeira def. Josiane Nunes by KO (punch), 2:46, Round 1

Carli Judice def. Yuneisy Duben by TKO (head kick), 1:40, Round 1