International Fight Week in the UFC dealt a nasty blow to Hawaii’s best mixed martial arts fighters.
The number of participants with Hawaii ties set to compete this week was cut in half when Makaha’s Yancy Medeiros and Waianae’s Max Holloway were pulled from fights from tonight’s UFC 226 pay-per-view for health reasons.
Friday night’s Ultimate Fighter finale event at the Pearl Theater in Las Vegas wasn’t much better for those who were healthy. Hawaii went 0-2 as Waiakea alumnus Brad Tavares and Waianae’s Rachael Ostovich were overmatched in their respective bouts.
Tavares, fighting in a main event for the first time in his career, was battered and bloodied in a five-round unanimous decision loss to Israel Adesanya.
Two judges scored the fight 50-45 and the third had it 49-46 for the undefeated Adesanya, who opened a nasty cut over Tavares’ right eye with an elbow in the fourth round.
Tavares (18-6, 12-5 UFC), ranked No. 8 at middleweight, had a four-fight winning streak snapped, while Adesanya (3-0 UFC), who is unranked, remained undefeated in his professional career at 14-0.
Ostovich suffered a third-round submission loss to Montana De La Rosa in a flyweight fight on the undercard to drop to 4-4 overall and 1-1 in the UFC.
Both fighters were at a significant reach disadvantage and it showed.
Tavares had his moments, especially early in the first round, but by the sound of the first horn, Adesanya had figured Tavares out.
Adesanya was warned for keeping his hands open and coming close to an eye poke in the second round. After referee Herb Dean stepped away, Adesanya landed a left kick to the gut that stunned Tavares and signaled the beginning of a brutal series of significant strikes.
Adesanya got Tavares’ attention in the third round with a right knee that sent Tavares’ head shooting back. Tavares implored Adesanya to hit him again and he obliged, using a trip to put Tavares on the ground for a brief second.
By the middle of the third round, Adesanya had doubled the total strikes landed by Tavares. He stayed patient but battered Tavares with power shots to end the round.
With his right eye beginning to swell, Tavares got his first takedown a minute into the fourth round and momentarily had Adesanya’s back. Adesanya switched positions and landed a series of punches to Tavares, bloodying his nose.
The referee stopped the fight to have doctors take a look at a a cut near Tavares’ right eye that was opened up by an elbow.
The fifth round was more of the same as Adesanya finished with a 127 to 46 advantage in strikes landed.
De La Rosa (9-4, 2-0) earned her seventh professional win by submission when Ostovich tapped out to a rear-naked choke at 4 minutes, 21 seconds of the third round.
“I was planning on getting a submission,” De La Rosa said after the fight. “I thought it was going to be hard to stay on her back because she’s got such good back defense, but that submission just presented itself. It was everything we game-planned for in this fight and it couldn’t have gone better.”
Ostovich, a Moanalua alumna, landed her best strike of the night with a spinning back fist at the end of the second round.
Two of the three judges gave Ostovich the second round and had the fight 19-19 going to the third. The third judge had De La Rosa ahead 20-18.
