At UFC Live: Kongo vs Barry, Nik Lentz and Charlies Oliveira met inside the Octagon and put on a show exciting enough to merit the Fight of the Night Award.
However, while the fight’s entertainment value was undeniable, the ending of the fight was extremely controversial.
In the second round, Oliveira hit a grounded Lentz with a big knee.
Kneeing a downed opponent is illegal in the UFC and the strike should have been considered a foul, but the referee did not stop the fight.
Lentz was badly rocked by the knee and, while he hung on for as long as he could, ended up being submitted with a rear-naked choke.
Many have been calling for the fight to be changed to a no contest and, according to MMAfighting.com, one of them is Lentz’ coach Greg Nelson.
“It’s the illegal knee that basically knocked Nik Lentz out so he could get his back and hook him,” Nelson told MMA Fighting on Monday evening. “I mean, he was clearly down. That knee broke Nik Lentz’s eye socket, so it was not a soft knee. He took his time, held the back of the head, wound up the knee and then let it go. …It was a super hard knee that ended up doing a lot of damage.”
Nelson went on to talk about how shocked he and other observers were when the referee did not stop the fight.
“All the other referees were jumping up, guys from the commission were jumping up, I was jumping up. A lot of people were wondering what was going on, why the fight wasn’t being stopped, because it was so blatant. Then the crowd, when they saw the replay, it was doubly obvious to them.”
For now, the fight remains a victory for Oliveira, but the Pennsylvania State Athletic Commission is currently reviewing the fight and executive director Greg Sirb has said that they will make their final decision this Wednesday, June 29th.
“After the referee came to me and we said we’d look at it, he had no qualms about looking at it, and we’re in the process of doing that,” said Sirb. “We looked at it a little bit last night and the ref will look at it again today, just to make sure we’re on the same page. We should have something I imagine some time [Wednesday].”
After his fight, Lentz spent the remainder of his Sunday night in the hospital. The full extent of his injury will not be known until Nik has a chance to see his own doctors in Minneapolis.
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