The opening week of the eighth season of Dana White’s Contender Series was full of highlight finishes and saw four fighters earn UFC contracts after picking up stoppage victories.
Week 2 of DWCS sees another five-fight card take place at the UFC Apex on Tuesday and this one features a pair of Canadians.
Pat Pytlik and Michael Imperato both earned their shots on DWCS with impressive stoppage wins at a Unified MMA event in Toronto in January the week of UFC 297 with Dana White there as a cage-side guest of honour.
That Unified MMA event and the two Canadian fighters were featured on a recent episode of Dana White: Lookin’ For a Fight.
Both Ontario natives will get to perform in front of White for a second time this year and another impressive showing could potentially result in them getting a UFC contract.
Imperato of Woodbridge, Ont., takes on Cortavious Romious in bantamweight action.
He is 12-6 as a pro with all but three of his wins coming by submission, including a 52-second rear-naked choke of Ricky Bandejas eight months ago.
Pytlik takes on Andreas Gustafsson in the featured bout of the night.
The 35-year-old Pytlik is 9-1 as a pro with six first-round knockouts. He knocked out his Unified MMA 55 opponent in 95 seconds to get on the UFC boss’s radar.
Another fighter competing Tuesday to keep an eye on is Torrez Finney, a bruising 8-0 middleweight coming off a viral knockout in May.
All 10 fighters scheduled to compete on the card made weight Monday.
DWCS Week 2 fight card and official weigh-in results:
— Welterweight: Andreas Gustafsson (170.5) vs Pat Pytlik (169)
— Heavyweight: Rizvan Kuniev (263.5) vs Hugo Cunha (259.5)
— Bantamweight: Cortavious Romious (136) vs Michael Imperato (135)
— Middleweight: Cam Rowston (184.5) vs Torrez Finney (185.5)
— Bantamweight: Billy Brand (135.5) vs Cody Haddon (135)