While the light heavyweight title fight headlining UFC 307 this weekend is garnering the most individual attention, Saturday’s return to Delta Center in Salt Lake City promises to be a pivotal night in the women’s bantamweight division.
In the co-main event, champion Raquel Pennington defends her title for the first time against former champ and ex-Ultimate Fighter teammate Julianna Pena in a grudge match more than a decade in the making.
Two fights before that on the main card, top contenders Ketlen Vieira and Kayla Harrison square off in a bout that in all likelihood will determine who will be next in line to challenge the winner of Saturday’s penultimate attraction.
With the top end of the division set to get sorted out, now feels like the right time to dig into those matchups a little deeper and examine the overall landscape in the 135-pound weight class.
Raquel Pennington vs. Julianna Pena
There is a deep history between these two that extends back to when they were contestants, then teammates, then roommates on The Ultimate Fighter: Team Rousey vs. Team Tate back in 2013, and after somehow never crossing paths inside the Octagon before this weekend, they’ll finally lock horns on Saturday, with the added bonus of the bantamweight title hanging in the balance.
Pennington has been on a strong run over the last four years, posting six straight victories since June 2020, capping it off by claiming the vacant title at UFC 297 earlier this year in Toronto.
There is nothing flashy or dynamic about her game — she is as blue-collar as they come inside the cage, leaning on her conditioning, grit, and durability to get the job done. While there has been the odd finish over the course of her career, for the most part, she’s a grinder that is going to use her allotted time to make your life miserable, and though it’s not often pretty, “Rocky” has been highly effective in handling her business, especially of late.
Pena heads into UFC 307 in an interesting position.
The last time she made the walk, she did so as the defending champion at UFC 277 where she dropped the title back to Amanda Nunes. Initially scheduled to face “The Lioness” in a trilogy fight in Vancouver at UFC 289, the TUF 18 winner suffered an injury, was forced to withdraw, and has been out of the mix ever since.
Stylistically, Pena is also more sandpaper than style, but where Pennington prefers throwing hands and working in the clinch, the challenger is at her best when she utilizes her wrestling to drag opponents to the canvas, where she’s shown solid top control and quality finishing abilities.
One of the most interesting wrinkles to this fight is how each of these women carry themselves in terms of where the stand in the division at the moment.
Pennington is a largely quiet champion, content to put in the work, stay out of the spotlight, and let her continued success inside the Octagon speak for her. She’s not going to sing her own praises very often, but when pushed, the 36-year-old veteran will make sure you understand that like it or not, she earned her place on the throne through hard work and incredible persistence, and nothing anyone says can change that.
Conversely, Pena has been presenting herself as the rightful ruler of the division since she lost the title back to Nunes. Heading into their scuttled trilogy bout, she talked a blue streak about proving she was the better fighter, and when Pennington and Mayra Bueno Silva fought for the belt back in January, she was quick to mock their efforts and dismiss their abilities.
From a professional wrestling standpoint, it’s quality heel work, but the rub is that she now has to step into the Octagon with Pennington and back up her non-stop chatter about being the best fighter in the division and a lock to reclaim the belt.
This is one of those contests that legitimately could play out in any number of manners, which elevates the intrigue, and the fact that we’ll know in advance who the eventual victor will be facing next ups the ante as well.
Ketlen Vieira vs. Kayla Harrison
Every so often a fight comes together where one competitor that has enjoyed pretty consistent success and rightfully worked their way into contention gets positioned against an opponent that feels like an inevitable force of nature, which results in everything they’ve done being glossed over and diminished, and their being viewed as some kind of “enhancement talent” being sent out to lose.
Such is life for Vieira at the moment, as the tenured contender and talented Brazilian has been cast as the next competitor set to get steamrolled by Harrison on Saturday night.
To be clear: that might happen, and probably is likely to happen, but that doesn’t mean Vieira is a scrub. Harrison just might be a generational talent poised to make a swift, devastating march to the top of the division.
The 33-year-old Vieira is 14-3 overall and has been in the championship mix for several years. Detractors will say she’s lost key fights that could have potentially carried her closer a title opportunity throughout her career, including decision losses to Pennington and Yana Santos. Of course, most people believe she deserved the nod against Santos without question, and her fight with Pennington was close, with 13 of the 15 media members submitting scores to MMADecisions saw things her way.
If either of those fights fall in her favour, perhaps the perception of Vieira is different. Now, you could say that about any number of competitors, but the greater point is that the Brazilian is no slouch, has been hovering in the top five for a number of years, and, on paper, is a solid test for Harrison in her sophomore appearance under the UFC banner.
As far as debuts go, you can’t do much better than Harrison did at UFC 300, where she made weight without issue, looking like she was sculpted out of granite, and then physically dominated Holly Holm for almost the entirety of the six minutes and change the fight lasted, out-landing her 51-2 while collecting five minutes of control time and a submission win.
The two-time Olympic gold medallist and two-time PFL tournament winner showed all the elements that make her an incredibly dangerous threat in the division right out of the gates, utilizing her elite grappling and incredible physical strength to rag-doll Holm before unleashing punishing elbows and strikes from top position and eventually lacing up the fight-ending choke. Now that she’s in a weight class that is better suited to her stature, there is a real possibility that we see even more convincing efforts than we did out of Harrison when she was crushing it in the PFL.
Heading into this one, the big questions are whether or not Vieira can find a way to (a) keep Harrison from dragging this to the canvas and (b) if she’ll have anything to offer if and when she’s put on the deck? The consensus answer to both queries is a resounding “No,” but the history of the sport is littered with shocking results, so we have to find out for sure.
Whoever wins has to be next in line to challenge for the title — they will have established themselves as the No. 1 contender, and if it is, in fact, Harrison, there is no other direction to take other than hustling the streaking new arrival into a championship bout in the opening quarter of next year.
That being said, don’t be surprised if Pena throws out a couple other potential names should she emerge victorious. Pennington will gamely welcome whomever is deemed to be next in line, but Pena feels like she’ll try to call some shots if she gets the belt back, which could make things interesting.
And who, you ask, may she call out?
First and foremost, Amanda Nunes.
She had pushed hard for the trilogy fight after dropping the title to Nunes at UFC 277, got hurt, and then had to watch from the front row as Nunes trounced Irene Aldana in Vancouver and called it a career. True to her heel nature, she accused the greatest female fighter of all time of ducking her, so if she gets the belt back this weekend, expect a Nunes call-out.
Option No. 2 is Valentina Shevchenko.
The two-time flyweight champ holds a previous win over Pena, and the idea of running it back in a champion vs. champion clash is, in theory, both an intriguing idea and one Shevchenko might even entertain, though the queue of contenders building in the 125-pound weight class makes this unlikely, at least for the moment.
OTHER NAMES TO KNOW
Norma Dumont put herself in the championship mix with her dominant win over Aldana at Noche UFC last month. The Brazilian has won five straight and eight of her last nine across two divisions, with her lone setback coming by split decision to…
Macy Chiasson, the former TUF winner who has also been rounding into form over the last couple years. The Fortis MMA product has earned back-to-back stoppage wins since getting caught with an upkick in a fight she was winning against Aldana at UFC 279, mauling Pannie Kianzad in March before opening a gnarly cut on the head of Bueno Silva in June that forced their fight to be halted.
With the top four in the division paired off in Salt Lake City this weekend, having Dumont and Chiasson run it back to determine the potential next No. 1 contender feels like an easy matchmaking decision to make.
Karol Rosa is coming off an excellent showing against Kianzad but has alternated wins and losses through her last seven fights. If she can string together a couple more wins and maintain the form she showed in her most recent outing, she has a chance to move up the divisional ladder.
Jacqueline Cavalcanti picked up her third straight UFC victory this past weekend in Paris, and at 27 years old, feels like the top young prospect in the division. She showed greater aggression and pressure in her win over Nora Cornolle and should merit a step up in competition next time out, which will provide a better understanding of where she stands in the division at the moment.
And lastly, Ailin Perez has to be taken seriously as a person of interest, at least until her current run of success is halted. The brash Argentine has won four straight, made quick work of Darya Zheleznyakova this past weekend, and very much feels like the 2024 version of Bethe Correia, who parlayed a couple solid wins and a ton of heat into a championship opportunity back in her day.