The fighters brought fireworks to the South Lawn of the White House.
With the iconic edifice as a backdrop, Justin Gaethje and Ciryl Gane went home from Washington with championship gold around their waists to close out one-of-a-kind UFC Freedom 250 on Sunday night. Gaethje stunned previously unbeaten Ilia Topuria to unify the lightweight title in a wild main event as Topuria’s corner threw in the proverbial towel following the fourth round, following Gane’s second-round victory over Alex Pereira to capture the vacant interim heavyweight belt.
The pair of bombastic endings to the title fights capped an all-knockout affair in the nation’s capital, with the president’s residence as a backdrop and the athletes entering the cage via the corridors of the landmark. Both Topuria and Gaethje began their respective walkouts from the Oval Office, walking past the portraits of every U.S. president along the way.
The main event played out as a bloody war, with a rally by the new champion the likes of which Knicks fans had become accustomed to throughout their march to the NBA title.
“I’m from America; 250 years ago, we were way bigger than 6-to-1 ’dogs, and look at us thriving now,” Gaethje said in the cage afterward.
A stinging straight right was Topuria’s most effective weapon early, though Gaethje bloodied his foe’s right eyebrow in a competitive opening round. Fists flew furiously from both men over the final minute, with Topuria gaining steam after the American’s early success.
Topuria’s greater focus on body punches made a difference by the midway point of the second, ripping to the liver and weathering a bloodied nose to put the pressure on Gaethje. A liver shot dropped Topuria, allowing Topuria to mount and nearly sell out for an armbar submission on two occasions in a dominant round.
But Topuria slowed considerably in the third, as Gaethje scored with the jab to claw back into it. Then came the fight-changing overhand right hand that dropped Topuria, leaving him a bloody mess as he survived Gaethje fishing for a choke.
After narrowly avoiding a doctor’s stoppage due to cuts, Topuria found a second wind early in the fourth round. But Gaethje quickly turned the tide back in his favor, mixing in his NCAA wrestling pedigree with his typical heavy-hitting striking arsenal. The American again battered him, leaving lumps and crimson littered across the Georgian-Armenian’s face.
At that point, Topuria’s corner determined their fighter had absorbed enough damage, giving Gaethje the undisputed championship that had eluded the son of Arizona miners for the duration of his highlight-rich UFC career.
“That was absolutely legendary,” Gaethje said.
In the co-main event, Gane found first-round success by volume but did not necessarily pushing Pereira into the danger zone of a finish. Pereira, meanwhile, was patient but looked several times to land a heavy right head kick.
The danger came quickly in the second round, with Gane dropping him in the first minute with a stiff jab as his opponent stepped in that had Pereira desperately looking to survive the follow-up flurry from the Frenchman — though many strikes appeared to land in the illegal area at the back of the Brazilian’s head.
Pereira finally regained his feet but never looked right as Gane rattled him again, forcing the referee to intervene for a standing stoppage as the Brazilian wobbled into the fence. The victory made Gane a two-time interim champion, though an undisputed title still eludes him.
“I’m moving well, I’m really technical, but the people underestimate me,” Gane said in the Octagon after denying Pereira’s bid to become the UFC’s first three-division champion.
The victory sets up a potential unification fight against Tom Aspinall, the champion who has not competed since he and Gane fought to a no-contest due to Gane delivering a damaging double eye poke that has forced Aspinall to undergo multiple reparatory procedures for his vision.
The early fights of the night also were fun while they lasted, making up for a 20-minute rain delay for the start of the broadcast and plenty of prefight handwringing over potential thunderstorms in the area. Only the main event lasted longer than the second round.
Sean O’Malley dropped Aiemann Zahabi, the event’s lone Canadian, for a walk-off KO without adding follow-up damage. Bo Nickal, a former three-time NCAA champion wrestler at Penn State, won the Battle for Pennsylvania on Pennsylvania Avenue with a finish of Philadelphia native Kyle Daukaus. Josh Hokit battered Derrick Lewis before the 41-year-old could sustain no more of the onslaught in the other USA vs. USA clash.
Brazilians Mauricio Ruffy and Diego Lopes earned emphatic finishes against American opponents Michael Chandler and Steve Garcia, respectively. Ruffy used the opportunity to propose his girlfriend, who said yes via a thumbs up.
The preponderance of short but sweet action wasn’t a major surprise and was practically by design for the event set up in celebration of the United States’ 250th birthday this year. Five of the seven bouts featured massively favored fighters compared to just two — Pereira-Gane and Lopes-Garcia – that hovered near or at pick-’em odds.
