Featherweight Diego Lopes caught Jean Silva with a spinning back elbow, followed by strikes to TKO Silva in Round 2 to cap off the main event of Noche UFC in San Antonio, Texas.
Lopes (27-7 MMA) halted Silva’s 13-fight winning streak, nearly finishing the Brazilian in Round 1 after several unanswered mount strikes led to Silva (16-3 MMA) surviving the opening round.
After bouncing back from his April title fight loss to UFC featherweight champion Alexander Volkanovski (27-4 MMA), Lopes refused to call for a rematch with Volkanovski or another fellow contender.
“I’m ready for the next opponent,” he said.
A bantamweight co-main event saw David Martinez earn a unanimous decision over Rob Font, utilizing volume striking and nearly securing a late third-round TKO before taking the cards 29-28, 29-28, 29-28. The victory for Martinez (13-1 MMA) was his ninth in a row, which snapped a two-fight winning streak for Font (22-9 MMA).
Lightweight Rafa Garcia earned a third-round TKO over long-time UFC veteran Jared Gordon, utilizing a right hand before following up with a flurry of ground-and-pound to secure his second KO/TKO win of his career. Garcia (18-4 MMA) has won four of his last five fights since December 2022, while Gordon (21-8 MMA) hasn’t won back-to-back fights in four years.
In a middleweight-turned-catchweight bout, former Ultimate Fighter winner and recently inducted UFC Hall of Fame “Fight Wing” member Kelvin Gastelum outlasted Dustin Stoltzfus by unanimous decision, taking the cards 30-27, 29-28, 29-28.
Gastelum (21-10 MMA) missed the contracted weight limit of 185 pounds by five pounds on Friday, resulting in a 35 percent forfeiture of his purse, according to the promotion. Gastelum, who has won two of his last three, apologized for missing weight following the fight. Meanwhile, Stoltzfus (16-8 MMA) fell to 3-7 in the promotion and has lost four of his previous six fights.
Lightweight Alexander Hernandez made good on a short turnaround, knocking out Carlos Diego Ferreira (19-7 MMA) in the second round in a back-and-forth affair. It was Hernandez’s second fight in nearly a month after defeating Chase Hooper (16-4-1 MMA) at UFC 319 last month in Chicago. Hernandez (18-8 MMA) has won four in a row.
A six-fight main card kicked off with bantamweight Santiago Luna winning his UFC debut with a first-round knockout against Quang Le. Luna (7-0 MMA) has continued his finishing streak dating to April 2023, whereas Le (9-3 MMA) has won just once since last August.
–Field Level Media
