By Neil Davidson
THE CANADIAN PRESS
LAS VEGAS — Hard-hitting Miguel Torres stopped Manny (The Mangler) Tapia via second-round TKO on Wednesday night to defend his World Extreme Cagefighting bantamweight title.
The 135-pounder from East Chicago, Ind., knocked Tapia (10-1-1) down twice with right hands before launching a ground barrage that forced referee Josh Rosenthal to step in three minutes four seconds into the round at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino.
"I knew Manny was going to come with big punches," said Torres (35-1). "I wanted to keep my range, use my jab to measure him up, and throw a couple of fakes and hit him with a big right hand."
Torres extended his mixed martial arts winning streak to 16 fights. The lone blemish on his record, a decision loss to Ryan Ackerman, was five years ago and he later avenged that defeat.
Featherweight Wagnney Fabiano (11-1), a native of Brazil who has made Montreal his home in recent years, won his WEC debut by choking out Japan’s Akitoshi Tamura (12-7-2) at 4:48 of the third round.
Unbeaten bantamweight Brian Bowles (7-0) won via guillotine choke over Brazilian Will Ribeiro (9-2) at 1:11 of the third round.
In other action:
— Bantamweight Joseph Benavidez won by decision over Danny Martinez.
— Welterweight Johny Hendricks scored a second-round TKO over Justin Haskins.
— Light-heavyweight Mark Munoz won by first-round TKO over Ricardo Barros.
— Featherweight Diego Nunes won a unanimous decision over Cole Province.
— Lightweight Bart Palaszewski scored a second-round TKO over Alex Karalexis.
— Featherweight Cub Swanson won a unanimous decision over Hiroyuki Takaya.
— Lightweight Shane Roller choked out Mike Budnik in the first round.
