The last Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) pay-per-view of 2023 just got a little more stacked.
Late Saturday evening (Sept. 23, 2023), UFC president Dana White announced that No. 10 ranked welterweight Vicente Luque will take on No. 11 seeded Ian Garry at UFC 296 on Dec. 16 from the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada.
Dana White announces Vicente Luque/Ian Garry at #UFC296 pic.twitter.com/PqqVDmO3fu
— Jed I. Goodman © (@jedigoodman) September 24, 2023
Luque (22-9-1) is coming off his first UFC main event win as he beat former Lightweight champion Rafael Dos Anjos via unanimous decision at UFC Vegas 79 (Aug. 12, 2023). Prior to his win against “RDA,” Luque suffered back-to-back losses for the first time in his UFC career. First, a unanimous decision to Belal Muhammad and then a brutal KO loss to Geoff Neal that left him with a brain bleed (watch highlights).
Garry (13-0) has been sensational thus far in his UFC career, winning all six of his fights, three of them by finish. The Irish fighter is coming off a three-round demolition of Neil Magny at UFC 292 in Boston. Before that, he had back-to-back knockouts of Daniel Rodriguez (watch highlights) and Song Kenan.
One significant tidbit to point out about the Welterweight matchup: both men train at Kill Cliff FC in Deerfield Beach, Fla.
Check out the rest of UFC 296’s insane lineup below:
- Leon Edwards (c) vs. Colby Covington
- Alexandre Pantoja (c) vs. Brandon Royval 2
- Stephen Thompson vs. Shavkat Rakhmonov
- Paddy Pimblett vs. Tony Ferguson
- Vicente Luque vs. Ian Garry