Earlier tonight (Wed. May 13, 2020) UFC Jacksonville took place from the VyStar Veterans Memorial Arena in Jacksonville, Florida.
The empty arena hosted a light heavyweight bout between Anthony Smith and Glover Teixeira in which Teixeira secured a TKO finish in the 5th round. In the co-main event of the evening, we saw Ovince Saint Preux make his heavyweight debut against Ben Rothwell. The move didn’t go quite as planned for OSP who lost a split decision after what was a slow performance. Outside of the main events, there were plenty of great fights and moments throughout the card that could have warranted bonuses.
Fight of the Night came early on the card as Brian Kelleher def. Hunter Azure in the second bout of the evening. In what was a stand-up war the two exchanged on the feet fairly evenly throughout the first round. Going into the second Kelleher’s aggressive style saw him find the knockout left hook towards the end of the round.
The First Performance of the Night bonus went to Drew Dober following his victory against prospect Alexander Hernandez. Dober asserted his dominance early pushing the pace and finding a home from his punches forcing Hernandez to shoot for a takedown. After returning to his feet Dober slowly worked away at Hernandez slowing him down with every punch that connected. The second round would see Dober’s combinations and aggression be too much for Hernandez finishing him via TKO 4:25 into the round.
The final Performance of the Night bonus went to Glover Teixeira for him main event win against Anthony Smith. What started as a dominant performance for Smith in the first two rounds quickly turned in round three. Round three saw Smith start to fatigue and Teixeira capitalized on this, he pushed the pace on the feet landed massive blows dropping Smith on multiple occasions. Once on the ground, Teixeira continued to control the bout with a mixture of ground and pound and submission attempts. This continued throughout the fourth round and into the fifth before being stopped by the ref 1:04 into the round.
What did you think of UFC Jacksonville?