Friday night’s Strikeforce Challenger event suffered an anticlimactic main event ending when the previously undefeated Billy Evangelista was disqualified for “intentionally” kneeing Mike Aina in the head while the Hilo fighter still had a knee on the ground. Aina was rewarded a “TKO” victory at 3:42 of round two in the lightweight match-up.
Neither fighter left the Save Mart Center in Fresno satisfied with the result. “I feel bad at what happened, but I am definitely planning to protest. Nothing I did was on purpose. I thought I had timed the knee perfectly and that he was on his feet when it was delivered,’’ said Evangelista after the fight.
Although Aina received the victory due to disqualification he took no pride in the win, “No one likes a fight to finish this way. I don’t look at it as a win for me, and he should not look at it as a loss for him. It should have been a no contest.’’
Replays of Evangelista’s “illegal knee” revealed it did not connect with Aina’s head at all, but rather hit his arm and drove it into his head (see photo). Aina was given time to recover, but finally the doctor deemed he could not continue due to an injury to his jaw. Aina did little to protest the stoppage.
In the 135-pound lone women’s bout on the card, Sarah Kaufman improved her unbeaten record to 9-0 with a unanimous decision victory over Miesha Tate. Kaufman had this to say about the match, “I give Miesha credit but I am very happy with my performance. I wish I could have done more in the second round, but three rounds go by so fast. I wish they’d let us fight five-minute rounds like the guys.”
The knockout of the night went to local heavyweight Fresno fighter Lavar Johnson who scored an 18-second, first-round KO over Carl Seumanutafa. Seumanutafa tried to shoot in on Johnson but got had his head down and got caught with a brutal right uppercut that knocked him unconscious and laid him face down on the canvas.
According to Johnson, the fight went just as planned, “This is exactly what I had practiced. I had watched tapes of Carl and knew he might try that kind of thing. This was an important win for me. I had my two young sons with me. No way was I going to let them see their Dad get beat up. No way they’d listen to me after that.’’
Aaron Rosa, who defeated Anthony Ruiz with a rear naked choke near the end of round one in their light heavyweight fight, talked about having to come back after getting caught with a punch early, “He got me, but then I rocked him good with a right hand off the cage. I feel good. This was a big win and I am grateful for Strikeforce giving me this opportunity. He was a slick guy but he didn’t do anything that I wasn’t prepared for, and was in control until the referee stopped the bout.
Even though Bao Quach was knocked down twice in the third round by Tito Jones in their featherweight opening match-up, Jones failed to capitalize on his opportunity to possibly finish, and in the end Quach got the unanimous nod. “I stuck to my game plan, which was to stick (kick) and move, and I did,’’ Quach said. “I know I won the first two rounds and he definitely got me in the third. I was dazed but he didn’t capitalize. But until the third round, he didn’t do anything. There was no doubt in my mind that I won the fight.’’
PRO MMA (promma.info) was live on the scene for this event. You can check our play-by-play and the complete results of the undercard HERE.
wow, great pictures. nice to have some resolution to see the details.
that picture of the “illegal” knee really helps sum up the sourness of the fight. good job.