Dan Hooker returns to lightweight at UFC 281, booked against Claudio Puelles

Dan Hooker will be returning to the lightweight division.

According to FordewinMMA, and later confirmed by the UFC, Hooker is set to return to the Octagon on November 12 UFC 281 against Claudio Puelles. The card will take place at Madison Square Garden in New York City, New York while the main event of the card will see Israel Adesanya defend his middleweight title against Alex Pereira.

Dan Hooker (21-12) dropped back down to featherweight last time out as he suffered a first-round TKO against Arnold Allen. After the loss, the Kiwi confirmed he would be moving back up to lightweight and that is now the case. Before the loss to Allen, Hooker took on Islam Makhachev on short notice at UFC 267 and suffered a first-round submission loss.

Prior to the back-to-back setbacks, Hooker beat Nasrat Haqparast at UFC 266 to return to the win column after a TKO loss to Michael Chandler and a decision loss to Dustin Poirier. In the UFC, Hooker is 11-8 and has notable wins over Gilbert Burns, Paul Felder, Al Iaquinta, Jim Miller, and James Vick among others.

Claudio Puelles (12-2) is riding a five-fight winning streak and coming off a submission win over Clay Guida back in April and before that, submitted Chris Gruetemacher by kneebar, the same submission he did against Guida.

In his UFC debut, Puelles lost by TKO to Martin Bravo in the TUF: Latin America 3 lightweight final, but since then has won five straight fights with his other wins coming over Jordan Leavitt, Marcos Mariano, and Felipe Silva.

With the addition of Hooker vs. Puelles at UFC 281, the card is as follows: