VANCOUVER,
BC, June 11 – Cain
Velasquez and Junior
dos Santos have
been on a collision course for a very long time. Their dream matchup
became reality on Saturday night at Rogers Arena as dos Santos
battered and bloodied Shane
Carwin over
three rounds and immediately thereafter was offered a shot at
Velazquez’s heavyweight title while standing in the Octagon with
the champ. See post-fight interview
“That’s awesome. Thank God for that,” said
dos Santos (13-1). “Much respect for Cain Velasquez, but Cain, I’m
coming for you.”
The unbeaten Velasquez (9-0) is
presently recovering from surgery on his rotator cuff and the date of
his return is unknown.
“I feel great,” the typically
humble and soft-spoken Velasquez said. “He (dos Santos) showed
awesome standup in this fight like always and he’s always
improving.”
Carwin, who has claimed all 12 of his
victories in the first round, was supposed to represent a stiff test
to the Brazilian stablemate of UFC middleweight champ Anderson
Silva and
the Nogueira brothers,Rodrigo and Rogerio.
But the speedier Dos Santos rocked and cracked the 254-pound
Coloradan with hard punches for much of the 15 minutes.
Early
on, it looked like Carwin would not make out of the first round when
dos Santos put him on the canvas with a wicked combination. Dos
Santos pounced and wailed away with dozens more blows, but an
embattled Carwin (12-2) gamely fought on and laid to rest any
questions about his cardio – which betrayed him in a loss to Brock
Lesnar last
year but was much improved (this fight marked the first time Carwin
has ever gone into the third round of a fight).
The
former NCAA Division II wrestling champ, who trimmed down for this
bout, succeeded at taking dos Santos down twice but could not hold
him there very long. In fact, dos Santos even managed to take a
profusely bleeding Carwin down twice in the third round – the
latter time with a hard slam.
“I’m improving my
wrestling also, so be careful my opponents,” dos Santos
said.
Judges saw the fight 30-27, 20-27 and 30-26 for
dos Santos.