Beatriz Mesquita is one of the most decorated Brazilian jiu-jitsu artists in all of combat sports and the touted women’s bantamweight prospect showed off her elite submission skills in a featured preliminary bout at UFC Fight Night: Kape vs. Horiguchi.
Rio de Janeiro’s Mesquita overcame getting rocked by England’s Melissa Mullins and snatched up a nice armbar submission to move to 3-0 in the UFC.
The 135-pound contest took place Saturday night at the Meta Apex in Las Vegas.
Mesquita submitted Irina Alekseeva in her October debut, then Montserrat Rendon earlier this year in March, in her first two UFC appearances, both with rear-naked chokes.
The 35-year-old was a 10-time world champion during her jiu-jitsu career and now trains out of American Top Team in Coconut Creek, Fla., where she is a teammate of current 135-pound UFC champion Kayla Harrison.
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Mesquita only made her professional mixed martial arts debut two years ago, but is already 8-0 and won a Legacy Fighting Alliance title in just her fifth pro bout, exactly one year before tapping Mullins.
Mullins is also a jiu-jitsu black belt and had never previously been submitted during MMA competition.
The final preliminary bout nearly ended in a no-contest after Kevin Borjas was down on the canvas in pain for five minutes following a low blow from Andre Lima. However, the bout continued, and Borjas pulled off the upset.
The unintentional foul occurred early in the second round following a close opening five minutes. Borjas was the biggest underdog on the entire card but earned a unanimous decision victory and became the first fighter to beat Lima.
Borjas was also the lone fighter on the card to miss weight Friday. Borjas was three pounds over the flyweight limit, which resulted in him forfeiting 20 per cent of his purse to Lima.
In other action, welterweight Levan Chokheli picked up a dominant 23-second win over Leon Shahbazyan. Georgia’s Chokheli, 29, is a seven-fight Bellator MMA veteran who sent a message in his UFC debut. Shahbazyan, 30, is the older brother of a UFC middleweight who fell to 12-5 in MMA with all five losses by KO/TKO.
Featherweight Michael Aswell Jr., a member of the Houston-based 4oz. Fight Club, had a special teammate in attendance cheering him on. Reigning UFC men’s flyweight champion Joshua Van was supporting Aswell, but it wasn’t enough to overcome the judges’ scorecards. He lost a tightly contested unanimous decision to Gaston Bolanos when all three judges scored 29-28 (two rounds to one).
Women’s bantamweight veteran Karol Rosa went the distance for the 13th consecutive time and continued her streak of alternating wins and losses, but unfortunately for her, that meant she dropped a unanimous decision to fellow Brazilian Luana Santos, who has now won three in a row.
Mitch Raposo overcame a knockdown midway through the final round to edge out Allan Nascimento by split decision and snap his fellow flyweight’s four-fight winning streak.
UFC newcomers Shane Collins and Otari Tanzilovi put on a spirited 15-minute tilt in the opening bout of the prelims, with Collins sweeping the scorecards.
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