Mike Malott finished Joaquin Buckley with a knee at 2:32 of Round 2 on Saturday night at Rogers Place in Edmonton, and the building went off. The UFC’s own account called it “THE HOMECOMING THEY WON’T FORGET” and said Malott sent the crowd “into a frenzy” with the knockout. Hard to argue with either part of that.
Malott leaves Edmonton at 15-2-1. Buckley drops to 21-9.
The UFC’s first clip of the finish labeled the knee wild, and a few minutes later its all-angles replay framed it as perfectly timed. Both descriptions hold up. A knee that lands at the exact moment a man commits is my favorite finish in the sport, because it’s half athleticism and half patience, and Malott had both in the second round. Championship Rounds posted that Malott put Buckley to sleep, and Spinnin Backfist’s reaction boiled down to what a knockout it was. The timing of the stoppage wasn’t up for debate, which tells you how clean it was.
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Buckley’s Fight Week Intensity
Buckley spent fight week looking like a man who’d sealed himself off. The UFC on Paramount+ account posted a clip of an interview in which, according to the account, he didn’t utter one word. Then at the final faceoff on Friday, Championship Rounds reported that he ignored Dana White’s handshake, and Happy Punch circulated a clip of White’s reaction to the snub.
You can read that two ways. Some fighters go silent because they’re completely dialed in, and Buckley clearly wanted that version of the story out there. The trouble with that much fight-week theater is that the fight still has to cooperate, and in the second round it stopped cooperating. Malott found the knee, the referee didn’t need long, and all that pre-fight focus ended on the canvas in front of a crowd that came to see exactly this.
For Malott, this is the kind of result that changes how a matchmaker thinks about you. He headlined a card at home, against an opponent who arrived with 21 pro wins and plenty of edge, and he won inside the distance. As of the UFC’s postfight posts, there was no announced next opponent for either man.
Jasudavicius Outlasts Blanchfield in the Co-Main
The co-main event was the only fight on the entire card that went to the judges. Jasmine Jasudavicius beat Erin Blanchfield by decision at women’s flyweight, going the full distance. The official results did not list the scorecards, so I’m not going to guess at them.
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Jasudavicius moves to 16-4. Blanchfield falls to 14-3. In a night where 12 of 13 fights ended early, a full-length grind in the co-main stood out simply because nobody else on the card let the judges near their fight. Jasudavicius getting her hand raised on the scorecards in Edmonton, right before Malott’s knockout, gave the crowd a pair of results it was clearly happy with.
The Rest of the Card
Cristian Pérez needed 27 seconds. He stopped Kyle Nelson at 0:27 of Round 1 at lightweight, the fastest finish of the night by a wide margin. Pérez is now 16-2, Nelson falls to 17-8-1, and the folks who were still finding their seats missed all of it.
Marc-Andre Barriault got his finish late in the opening round, stopping Kyle Daukaus at 4:28 of Round 1 at middleweight. Barriault improves to 18-11 and Daukaus drops to 17-6. Thirty-two seconds from the horn is a brutal place to lose a round, never mind a fight.
Timmy Cuamba stopped Louis Jourdain at 2:48 of Round 2 at bantamweight. Cuamba goes to 11-4, Jourdain to 9-4. These two came in with nearly identical loss columns, and Cuamba made sure they left with very different ones.
Mandel Nallo took the first round to get comfortable and then ended things fast in the second, stopping Nate Landwehr at 0:47 of Round 2 at lightweight. Nallo moves to 15-4. Landwehr, who came in with 18 wins of his own, slips to 18-9. The quick second-round finish means something happened in that corner between rounds, and whatever it was, it worked.
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Quick Hits From Further Down the Card
A weird pattern ran through the lower half of the results sheet: fighters kept finding stoppages right before the bell. Five of the seven fights listed below ended in the final 45 seconds of a round, and three of those came in the last minute of Round 3, when the scorecards were almost in play.
- Tanner Boser stopped Jhonata Diniz at 4:26 of Round 3 at heavyweight. Boser goes to 23-11-1, Diniz to 9-3.
- Nick Galanti stopped Julien LeBlanc at 1:26 of Round 1 at middleweight. Galanti is 9-1 now, LeBlanc 10-4.
- Joel Faglier stayed perfect, stopping Javad Mahjoub at 2:11 of Round 2 at heavyweight. Faglier is 7-0, Mahjoub 5-1.
- Katlyn Cerminara stopped Mackenzie Stiller at 4:46 of Round 1 at women’s flyweight. Cerminara is 19-6, Stiller 6-2.
- Steven Koslow stopped Chad Anheliger at 4:31 of Round 3 at bantamweight. Koslow moves to 7-1, Anheliger to 13-9.
- Chelsea Chandler stopped Melissa Croden at 4:52 of Round 1 at women’s bantamweight. Both women came in with matching records, and Chandler left at 8-4 with Croden at 8-4 as well per the official listing.
- SuYoung You stopped Cody Chovancek at 4:19 of Round 3 at bantamweight. You goes to 17-4, Chovancek to 9-1.
Faglier’s 7-0 is the record I’ll be watching. Heavyweights who keep finishing people stay employed, and he’s now got a UFC-card stoppage in Edmonton on his ledger. Galanti’s 9-1 is the other one worth circling, given how quickly he got LeBlanc out of there.
Twelve stoppages on a 13-fight card is about as good a night as a crowd can ask for. The co-main gave the judges their only work of the evening, and the main event gave Edmonton a knee it’ll be replaying for a while. The UFC had already posted that knee from every angle within about 11 minutes of the finish.
Full Results
- Mike Malott def. Joaquin Buckley (KO, knee, Round 2, 2:32)
- Jasmine Jasudavicius def. Erin Blanchfield (decision)
- Cristian Pérez def. Kyle Nelson (stoppage, Round 1, 0:27)
- Marc-Andre Barriault def. Kyle Daukaus (stoppage, Round 1, 4:28)
- Timmy Cuamba def. Louis Jourdain (stoppage, Round 2, 2:48)
- Mandel Nallo def. Nate Landwehr (stoppage, Round 2, 0:47)
- Tanner Boser def. Jhonata Diniz (stoppage, Round 3, 4:26)
- Nick Galanti def. Julien LeBlanc (stoppage, Round 1, 1:26)
- Joel Faglier def. Javad Mahjoub (stoppage, Round 2, 2:11)
- Katlyn Cerminara def. Mackenzie Stiller (stoppage, Round 1, 4:46)
- Steven Koslow def. Chad Anheliger (stoppage, Round 3, 4:31)
- Chelsea Chandler def. Melissa Croden (stoppage, Round 1, 4:52)
- SuYoung You def. Cody Chovancek (stoppage, Round 3, 4:19)
