Valentina Shevchenko is UFC women’s flyweight champion once again. Shevchenko defeated Alexa Grasso in the co-main event of UFC 306 on Saturday, taking a dominant decision after successfully executing a wrestling-based gameplan. The fight, which took place in Las Vegas’ Sphere, was a trilogy bout after Grasso ended Shevchenko’s lengthy run as champion in March 2023 before a split draw the following September.
Shevchenko came out aggressively in the opening frame and it took less than 90 seconds before she secured her first takedown. That had been a path to success in the previous two fights with Grasso, and Shevchenko appeared committed to following a blueprint based on what she and her camp had seen in nearly 10 rounds of previous action.
Less than a minute into the second round, Shevchenko went right back to the takedown and ended up inside Grasso’s guard once again. Unlike the first round, Grasso was able to transition from the threat of a submission to escaping back to standing. Unfortunately for the champion, Shevchenko took her right back down.
The fight fell fully into the pattern of round after round where Shevchenko would score a takedown, Grasso would threaten with a submission attempt and Shevchenko would survive before dominating the rest of the round.
All in all, it was not a thrilling performance but it was an effective one as Shevchenko finally scored the victory over Grasso that had eluded her in their prior two meetings.
After the completion of five rounds, the official scorecards read 50-45 across the board, all for Shevchenko.
“The gameplan was just to get in here and fight to the end,” Shevchenko said after the fight, describing her performance as simplistically as the gameplan she brought to the fight.
With the win, Shevchenko got revenge on one of the three women to defeat her in her professional career. Shevchenko had already gotten revenge over Liz Carmouche, but her two losses against women’s MMA legend Amanda Nunes will go unavenged after Nunes retired from active competition in June 2023.
Elsewhere on the card, Diego Lopes battered Brian Ortega and left him a bloody mess by the end of three rounds to move up the featherweight rankings. Lopes and Ortega were scheduled to fight at UFC 303 before Ortega fell ill on fight night and was forced to withdraw. Lopes picked up his third win of the year and moved himself closer to a title shot. Plus, Esteban Ribovics and Daniel Zellhuber delivered an epic battle that may become a Fight of the Year contender as both men laid it all on the line in scoring multiple knockdowns — including a dramatic third round where both men were nearly stopped.
