Emotional Chiesa takes ‘TUF’ title
After battling through the emotions of his father’s death in March to reach the final of “The Ultimate Fighter,” Michael Chiesa was not about to fall one step short of reaching his goal.
The 24-year-old lightweight submitted Al Iaquinta 2:47 into the first round to earn the Season 15 “TUF” title on an Ultimate Fighting Championship card at the Palms on Friday night.
“This is exactly what I wanted,” Chiesa said. “There’s no way I was going to sell myself short. I overcame a lot of things to win this fight.”
In the co-main event, Las Vegan Martin Kampmann recovered from early trouble in the first and second rounds to knock out Jake Ellenberger with a series of right knees at 1:40 of the second round.
Kampmann is now likely to fight Johny Hendricks, with the winner getting a shot at either injured welterweight champion Georges St. Pierre or interim champion Carlos Condit.
While Kampmann’s victory was more meaningful as far as the UFC title picture, Chiesa’s win was by far the most emotional of the card.
Seconds after Iaquinta went to sleep from Chiesa’s choke, Chiesa’s mother and sister entered the cage and wept as all three embraced.
“I can’t even talk right now,” his mother, Teresa, said through the tears.
Chiesa says he is ready to move on.
“It definitely has set in. I’ve already got my next goals set,” he said, stating his intentions to quickly become a contender in the division. “It’s definitely surreal and the culmination of a whole lot of hard work, but within a half hour, I’ve already set my sights on my next goal.”
It didn’t take long for Chiesa to get the finish once he was able to grab Iaquinta near the cage. Chiesa wrapped up Iaquinta and pulled him to the ground, taking his back in the process. From there, Chiesa methodically locked in the fight-ending choke.
Kampmann faced a much more difficult path to victory. He was dropped by Ellenberger with a big left hook seconds into the fight and spent almost the entire first round on his back against the cage.
Ellenberger again caught Kampmann with a big punch early in the second round and badly bloodied his nose.
Kampmann got out of trouble with a left hand that staggered Ellenberger, then charged in and got Ellenberger in a clinch before landing three knees that dropped him and forced referee Steve Mazzagatti to stop the fight.
It was the second straight comeback victory for Kampmann, who was also in trouble against Thiago Alves in March before pulling out a late submission win.
“I would definitely prefer to be punched a lot less. My wife is not going to be very happy about this,” he said of his bloody nose.
Mazzagatti waved off the fight as soon as Ellenberger hit the mat after he had allowed the fight to go on when Kampmann was in trouble in the first round.
“It’s not up to me. It’s up to the ref,” Ellenberger said. “He had a better night. What can you do?”
Kampmann wasn’t ready to analyze the fight just yet.
“I’m going to have to watch it on tape to give you a good answer on that, but I can tell you one thing: You can never count me out. I don’t want you to ever stop the fight. I’m going to be there fighting to the very end,” he said.
The win was the third in a row for Kampmann after consecutive controversial decision losses. Otherwise, he could be on a seven-fight winning streak.
Charles Oliveira won his second straight fight by submission since dropping to featherweight, with a second-round guillotine choke on former “TUF” winner Jonathan Brookins.
Fellow featherweight prospect Max Holloway earned his first UFC victory with a unanimous decision over Pat Schilling, and Justin Lawrence knocked out John Cofer with a highlight-reel head kick to round out the main card.
Contact reporter Adam Hill at ahill@reviewjournal.com or 702-224-5509. Follow him on Twitter: @adamhilllvrj.
