Death, taxes and Brendan Allen wins by rear-naked choke.
For the 15th time in his MMA career, "All In" ended a fight with an RNC submission, this time forcing Christian Leroy Duncan to tap in the fifth round of their main event middleweight bout at UFC Vegas 122 on Saturday.
What was a back-and-forth affair for a majority of the near-23 minutes, ended how so many of Allen's fights have. The American shot for a takedown along the fence and eventually wore down Duncan to the canvas until Allen was able to take the Englishman's back and sink in a decisive rear-naked choke.
The win not only improved Allen's win streak in the UFC to four straight, but also bumped him to third all-time among the promotion's 185-pounders with his 15th win in the weight class. Saturday's win from the Meta APEX in Las Vegas also marked the 30-year-old's ninth stoppage win, which is also third-most all-time in middleweight history.
His 15 wins at 185 pounds trail only Brad Tavares and Michael Bisping at 16. And call it serendipity that Bisping was on the mic to interview Allen inside the octagon after the win.
Allen even made sure to — jokingly — call out Bisping out of retirement before earnestly staking his claim to challenge former champ Dricus Du Plessis and reigning belt-holder Sean Strickland. And after defending his No. 5 ranking in the middleweight standings against 10th-ranked Duncan (snapping a five-fight win streak), and improving to 16-4-0 in the UFC, Allen's made quite the compelling case.
He wasn't the only one to secure an early finish on Saturday, however, as eight fights out of 12 on the Fight Night card ended via stoppage. The other two early endings on the main card both came by way of wicked headkicks. First, Otari Tanzilovi turned off Malcolm Wellmaker's lights in the second round to earn not only his first UFC win, but also his first performance of the night bonus. Andre Fili then one-upped Tanzilovi with a headkick KO of his own, sleeping Kai Kamaka III in arguably an even more devastating fashion just 20 seconds into the second round of their featherweight bout.
The two other fights on the main card both ended via unanimous decision as Mexican-Canadian Loopy Godinez defended her No. 11 ranking among women's strawweights against Ketlen Souza (29-28, 29-28, 29-28), while Jai Herbert took care of business against Matheus Camilo (29-28, 29-28, 29-28) to earn back-to-back wins for the first time in his UFC career.
As for the prelims, the featured bout on the early half of the card ended midway through the second round, when Julius Walker's ground-and-pound assault of Gerald Meerschaert forced a stop to the contest.
The result capped off an action-packed prelim slate that included six consecutive stoppages out of seven fights — half of which saw underdogs pulling off upsets. The biggest of which was Brendson Ribeiro (plus-310), submitting Felipe Franco less than two minutes into the opening round to snap a four-fight skid.
Meanwhile, Allen Frye Jr. dispatched RJ Harris three minutes into Round 1 of the lone heavyweight bout of the night when he connected with a flurry of strikes to his opponent's chin.
The final underdog victory came from Niko Price, who ended his UFC career in style as he TKO'd Leon Shahbazyan less than two minutes into the American's retirement fight. Although, with the emphatic nature of the win, and considering Price now has the fourth-most finishes (seven) among active welterweights, it's hard to imagine him not at least considering there's more left in the tank.
Price admitted as much after snapping his four-fight skid.
"If you guys call me, I might answer," he told Bisping in the octagon while gesturing over towards UFC matchmaker Sean Shelby. "... You never know."
The UFC returns to action from Rogers Place in Edmonton on Oct. 17 for another Fight Night card, headlined by Burlington, Ont. native Mike Malott against Joaquin Buckley for a ranked welterweight bout.
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