Vicente Luque defeats former lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos in five-round UFC Vegas 78 main event
The Ultimate Fighting Championship returned to us tonight, August 12, 2023, for UFC Vegas 78, going down live from the UFC Apex in Enterprise, Nevada.
Headlining the event was a Brazil versus Brazil showdown between former UFC lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos (32-15) and no. 10 ranked welterweight contender Vicente Luque (22-9-1).
Dos Anjos came into the bout having gone 3-1 over his latest four appearances, submitting Bryan Barberena in his most recent outing, while Luque came in on a two-fight skid following a 10-1 stretch from 2017 to 2022.
Continue reading to see how this 170 lb main event of the evening went down:
Official Result:
Luque lands the first hard strike of the fight, a nice round kick to the body. Dos Anjos lands a good right hand shortly thereafter before shooting in on a takedown. Luque defends well, though he’s pressed into the fence for roughly two minutes of the opening round. Luque ends up taking dos Anjos down toward the end of round one.
Dos Anjos secures his first takedown of the fight in round two after failing on his first attempt. Luque is right back to his feet however and takes dos Anjos down himself.
Luque secures another takedown early in the third, his fourth of the fight, before dos Anjos gets back to his feet and gets to work with his striking, landing a lot of body kicks and solid punches. Luque is landing good counters as well.
Luque secures his fifth takedown of the fight less than two minutes into round four. He also secures his sixth at the end of the round, where he ends the round cranking on the neck of the former lightweight champion.
Luque secures takedown number seven about three minutes into the fifth and final round, though dos Anjos gets right back to his feet. Dos Anjos lets go with his striking in the final two minutes, coming close to landing head kicks on more than one occasion. The striking forces a takedown shot out of Luque, who ends the final 20 seconds of tonight’s main event on his back.
The commentators were stating how evenly matched these two are, it’s the fact that Luque is the bigger and stronger man, the natural welterweight, being the reason he won this fight. That appears to be true.
Vicente Luque improves to 2-1 against world champions tonight at UFC Vegas 78; following defeat to future, now current UFC welterweight champion Leon Edwards (UD) in March of 2017, Luque has since defeated former UFC welterweight champion Tyron Woodley (D’Arce choke), and now former lightweight champion Rafael dos Anjos (UD).
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