Live from the Rogers Arena in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Tickets on Sale Saturday, April 16 at 10 a.m. PT
Press Release – With the heavyweight division better than it’s ever been, the Ultimate Fighting Championship® (UFC®) is proud to confirm another blockbuster matchup that is sure to shake up the UFC Octagon® as well as the mixed martial arts community. Former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar faces the man with the most dangerous hands in the heavyweight division – Junior dos Santos – as The Ultimate Fighter®: Team Lesnar vs. Team dos Santos coaches collide at UFC 131: LESNAR vs. DOS SANTOS, live from Rogers Arena in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada on Saturday, June 11.
“Brock Lesnar and Junior dos Santos are two of the most explosive heavyweights in the game, and I give both of them a lot of respect for taking this fight,” UFC President Dana White said. “Brock wanted the quickest way back to a title shot, and he’s willing to go through dos Santos to do it. Junior could have waited around for his shot at the belt, but as a true fighter he didn’t want to sit around, and now he faces one of the toughest guys in the game. This is going to be one of the biggest heavyweight fights in years, and it’s guaranteed to be all-action from start to finish.”
“We are pleased to have the UFC return to Rogers Arena. We are committed to providing a world class experience for all of our guests at each and every event we host,” said Canucks Sports & Entertainment Vice President & General Manager, Arena Operations, Harvey Jones. “We recognize British Columbians’ passion for sports, entertainment and the UFC and are excited to be able to host this event again this year.”
Plus, four other highly-anticipated matches will be featured on the main card as UFC heavyweight title contender Shane Carwin looks to jump right back in the title hunt when he faces dangerous ground fighter Jon Olav Einemo. Coming off his head-turning submission victory over Paul Kelly, Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone takes on UFC vet Mac Danzig. Then submission specialist Demian Maia meets middleweight contender Mark Munoz, and crowd favorite Kenny Florian makes his featherweight debut against red-hot Diego Nunes.
Tickets for UFC® 131: LESNAR vs. DOS SANTOS are priced at $650, $450, $325, $225, $135 and $85, not including applicable service charges, and go on sale Saturday, April 16 at 10 a.m. PT at the Rogers Arena box office, all Ticketmaster outlets or at www.ticketmaster.ca. To charge by phone with a major credit card, call Ticketmaster at (855) 985-5000.
UFC® Fight Club™ members will have the opportunity to purchase tickets to this event Thursday, April 14 at 10 a.m. PT via the website www.ufcfightclub.com. A special Internet ticket pre-sale will be available to UFC newsletter subscribers Friday, April 15, starting at 10 a.m. PT. To access this presale, users must register for the UFC newsletter through UFC.com .
UFC® 131: LESNAR vs. DOS SANTOS will be available live on Pay-Per-View at 9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT on iN DEMAND, DirecTV, DISH Network, Avail-TVN, BellTV, Shaw Communications, Sasktel, and Viewer’s Choice Canada for a suggested retail price of $44.99 US/$49.99 CAN for Standard Definition and $54.99 US/$59.99 CAN for High Definition.
The most polarizing figure in all of mixed martial arts, former UFC heavyweight champion Brock Lesnar (fighting out of Webster, South Dakota / professional record – 5-2) came onto the scene and earned the title in his third UFC fight with a dominating victory over legend and UFC Hall-of-Famer Randy Couture at UFC 91. A 2000 NCAA Division I national champion wrestler at the University of Minnesota, the 33-year-old has parlayed an impressive amateur wrestling career into a successful mixed martial arts one. With stoppage wins over Couture, Frank Mir and Shane Carwin, Lesnar is dangerous for any opponent and is focused on earning the UFC heavyweight title once again.
With a perfect 6-0 record in the UFC, Junior dos Santos (fighting out of Santa Catarina, Brazil / 12-1) finished his first five fights against names such as Mirko Cro Cop, Gabriel Gonzaga, Gilbert Yvel, Stefan Struve and Fabricio Werdum. The 27-year-old rising star has one of the top striking games in the heavyweight division and showed his ability to go into deep water with his three-round unanimous decision victory against seasoned vet Roy “Big Country” Nelson in his last match at UFC 117.
A fighter that was moments away from earning the UFC heavyweight title, Shane Carwin (fighting out of Greeley, Colo. / 12-1) took Lesnar to the brink of defeat in their epic UFC 116 battle before the then-champion was able to turn the tide back in his favor. The Lesnar fight marked the first time Carwin, a former college wrestler and football player, had ever been out of the first round, a streak that included stoppages over Frank Mir, Gabriel Gonzaga, Neil Wain and Christian Wellisch. But now the 36-year-old engineer looks to get back into the title picture with a win over the experienced Jon Olav Einemo.
A fighter that is making his UFC debut against a tough, seasoned opponent, submission grappling ace Jon Olav Einemo (fighting out of Breda, Netherlands / 6-1) is a PRIDE® veteran and a very dangerous ground fighter that holds five of his six wins by submission. A 2003 champion in the esteemed Abu Dhabi world submission fighting championships, Einemo, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt, is the only person to ever defeat ADCC legend Roger Gracie and now looks to parlay his grappling success into a memorable UFC career.
Donald “Cowboy” Cerrone (fighting out of Albuquerque, N.M. / 14-3-0, 1 NC) returns to the Octagon® in search of his second straight UFC win. A fighter that can put opponents away with his impressive kick boxing or his relentless jiu-jitsu, the 28-year-old Denver, Colorado native put together a solid resume in the WEC with wins over Chris Horodecki, Jamie Varner, Ed Ratcliff, James Krause, Rob McCollough and Danny Castillo – and with a second-round submission over Paul Kelly in his UFC debut, the lightweight division better take notice because “Cowboy” just rode into town.
A veteran of 30 professional fights, Mac Danzig (fighting out of Los Angeles, Calif. / 21-8-1) is a 31-year-old veteran that is now just hitting his stride. Coming off an impressive first-round stoppage over one-time UFC lightweight title contender Joe Stevenson at UFC 124 in Montreal, the Cleveland, Ohio native and proud vegan will be fighting for the third consecutive time in Canada and is becoming a crowd favorite north of the border. With four wins in the UFC, Danzig knows what it takes to succeed under the bright lights.
One of the most decorated grapplers in the UFC, Brazilian jiu-jitsu black belt Demian Maia (fighting out of Sao Paolo, Brazil / 14-2) has five submission victories in the UFC over fighters such as Chael Sonnen, Nate Quarry, Jason MacDonald, Ed Herman and Ryan Jensen. The two-time world champion in Brazilian jiu-jitsu has won three out of his last four fights with his only loss coming to UFC middleweight champion Anderson Silva.
Another former NCAA Division I national champion wrestler turned successful mixed martial artist, Mark Munoz (fighting out of Vallejo, Calif. / 10-2) is riding a two-fight win streak, including a unanimous decision victory over Aaron Simpson and a first-round knockout over Simpson’s Arizona State friend and training partner CB Dollaway. A winner of five out of his last six fights, the versatile Munoz is dangerous on the ground and on his feet and is looking to burst into the title picture with a win against Maia.
Former lightweight title contender Kenny Florian (fighting out of Brookline, Mass. / 15-5) will be making his debut at featherweight in Vancouver and could become an instant contender in a division that features unstoppable champion Jose Aldo. With victories over some of the biggest names in the 155-pound division, including Takanori Gomi, Clay Guida, Joe Lauzon, Din Thomas, Joe Stevenson and Roger Huerta, the Boston-area jiu-jitsu black belt will be one to look out for at his new home at 145-pounds.
Ready to welcome Florian into the 145-pound division, Diego Nunes (fighting out of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil / 16-1) won four out of his five fights in the World Extreme Cagefighting® (WEC®) and defeated former WEC featherweight champion Mike Brown in his UFC debut in January. A Southern Brazil Muay Thai and boxing champion, Nunes plans to use his elite striking to get past Florian on June 11 and fuel a run toward UFC gold.
Additional bouts will be announced at a later date. For more information, or current UFC fight news, visit UFC.com. All bouts live and subject to change.
About Ultimate Fighting Championship
Owned and operated by Zuffa, LLC, and headquartered in Las Vegas, Nev., UFC® produces over 12 UFC live Pay-Per-View events annually around the world. UFC programming is distributed in the United States on Viacom, Inc.’s Spike TV and on Comcast, Inc.’s VERSUS network. UFC content is distributed commercially through Joe Hand Promotions in the U.S. and Canadastar in Canada. Globally, UFC programming is broadcast in over 145 countries and territories, reaching 354 million homes worldwide, in 19 different languages.
UFC® also boasts a powerful presence online, with UFC.com attracting over six million unique visitors per month, while also possessing one of the most powerful social media followings in all of professional sports. To date, UFC has over five million fans on Facebook and nearly 250,000 followers on Twitter. In addition, UFC President Dana White is one of the most accessible and most followed executives in sports with nearly 1.4 million followers on Twitter. On January 22, 2011, UFC continued to set trends in social media, becoming the first major sports league to stream live, broadcast quality action on Facebook.
Ancillary businesses include the best-selling UFC “Undisputed” videogame franchise distributed by THQ, UFC Gym™, UFC Fight Club affinity program, UFC Fan Expo™ festivals, branded apparel, trading cards, articulated action figures and other media including best-selling DVDs and a bimonthly magazine.
About Rogers Arena
Located at 800 Griffiths Way in Vancouver, BC, Rogers Arena, owned and operated by Canucks Sports & Entertainment, is one of the premier sports and entertainment facilities in North America. Highly praised for its comfortable seating and superior sight lines, visitor hospitality lies at the heart of this 475,000 sq. ft. building that can currently accommodate up to 18,860 guests.
Inside Rogers Arena, guests can expect an array of amenities including exclusive food and beverage service courtesy of Aramark Sports & Entertainment. With more than 30 concession locations and a total of 165 points of sale, guests at Rogers Arena can choose from a variety of menu items including: Boston Pizza, White Spot Express, Grimms Classic Dogs, Mexican Cuisine, Asian fare and Sushi. With a reputation for the finest selections on any catering menu, Aramark provides all in-suite catering and bar service for the 100 Executive and Hospitality suites located throughout Rogers Arena.
Canucks Sports & Entertainment is committed to providing a world class experience to fans attending events at Rogers Arena. In 2008, Rogers Arena enhanced the acoustic infrastructure in-arena and throughout the building. Integrated and installed by Rocky Mountain Production Services, the system features state-of-the-art L’Acoustics line-source speakers, amplifiers and digital signal processors operating on a fiber optics network designed to provide the ultimate fan experience. Complementing the acoustic system is one of the NHL’s best video and scoring displays featuring industry-leading Daktronics high resolution ProStar® LED video screens with accompanying ribbon board extending the circumference of the arena’s 300-level seating. The main video display is comprised of four LED screens, wrapped by an additional four corner screens, centred between two large circular displays suspended above and below the system. Rogers Arena also features highly-skilled in-house production, lighting and rigging crews and outstanding broadcast capabilities.