Canadian fighters impress again at UFC Fight Night Vancouver

Published 11:44 pm Saturday, October 18, 2025

Rogers Arena continues to be a haven for Canadian mixed martial artists, and that was evident following UFC Fight Night on Saturday (Oct. 18).

Fighters from the great white north went 5-2, which follows up a 5-0 run for Canucks at the UFC 289 show on June 10, 2023.

The most notable win for Canadians was Ontario’s Mike Malott, who earned a unanimous win (29-28, 29-28 and 29-28) over American Kevin Holland.

But the win didn’t come without a little controversy, as Malott struck Holland with a low blow late in the first round which led to a five-minute delay as Holland recovered. There was some doubt if he would continue, however Holland re-entered the fight but appeared to still be suffering the effect of the illegal shot when the fight resumed. All three judges did score the first round for Holland.

Holland continued to be in discomfort for some of the second round and wasn’t able to put much together against Malott in the third and final round. All three judges scored both the second and third rounds for Malott.

He admitted it was a bit of an odd fight and the low blow delay contributed to some of the weirdness.

“I swear my knee hit him in the hip and my shin I think brushed his cup,” he said. “He’s just so tall and is all limbs. I don’t think he was being dramatic or anything.”

Malott said the long delay and Holland’s behaviour following it caused him to question his strategy a bit.

“He’s a chaotic guy, is he doing this because he wants me to rush in and do something stupid,” he said. “And then he’ll rip out his right hand and try and knock me out. Is he playing possum? Can he just not continue? Maybe I should have got on him a bit more.”

Malott improves to 13-2-1 with the victory and he is now likely to be ranked in the top-15 in the welterweight division with the win.

Another Canadian with a star making performance was Quebec’s Charles Jourdain. He stopped England’s Davey Grant at 3:05of the first round after an incredible flurry of offence that started with a jumping knee strike and ended with a guillotine choke.

Jourdain’s career record moved to 17-8-1 after the win and the bantamweight fighter has won two straight. He was feeling good after the win.

“I just have the best guillotine in the game,” he said. “I feel like I was a phoenix crashing down as a featherweight [weight class he was previously competing at] and I was just fighting to fight. Now I have found a different purpose ever since my son came into this world I’m fighting for something bigger than myself.”

One of the more crowd engaging fights saw Quebec’s Aiemann Zahabi edge Ecuador’s Marlon Vera (29-28, 29-28 and 28-29)via split decision.

“I feel ecstatic, I feel like a million dollars and I gave the fans another war and another memorable fight,” he said. “I thought I won the first round and round two I got stunned a little bit, but I recovered very well and finished that round stronger than he did. I carried that momentum into the third and I knew if I left it all out there I could win.”

But it wasn’t all success for Canadian fighters, as Ontario’s Jasmine Jasudavicius five-fight win streak ended with a thud to France’s Manon Fiorot. She lost via TKO (strikes) at 1:14 of the first round.

Jasudavicius entered the fight ranked fifth in the flyweight division and this was an opportunity to possibly challenge for a title if she could overcome the second-ranked Fiorot, but the unsuccessful result is a major setback.

Other Canadian results included: Ontario’s Kyle Nelson with a unanimous win (30-27, 29-28 and 29-28) over Matt Frevola, Calgary’s Melissa Croden over Tainara Lisboa (third round TKO) and Drew Dober defeating Ontario’s Kyle Prepolec (third round TKO).

The Nelson match featured a head-scratching referee decision, which saw Nelson appear to finish the fight via strikes near the end of round one. The referee then seemed to claim that the time had run out, when in fact there were still three seconds left.Both fighters appeared to believe the fight had been called, but it continued.

The show’s main event saw another bizarre finish, as Brendan Allen controlled most of the first four rounds and Reinier De Ridder was unable to continue into the fourth and the fight was called.

Allen said he was confident that he could outlast De Ridder and said he overwhelmed the fourth-ranked middleweight fighter.Allen entered the fight ranked ninth and said he thinks he should be at least fourth after the win but was uncertain he would get the recognition.

“For some reason they don’t like me so I’ll probably be sixth or seventh,” he said, laughing. “I just beat number four so I should be number four.”

It was the second win in a row for Allen after suffering losses to Anthony Hernandez in February and Nassourdine Imavov in September.

Other results from the show included: Aoriqileng beating Cody Gibson (first round TKO), Bruno Silva over HyunSung Park(third round submission), Djorden Santos over Danny Barlow (unanimous decision), Stephanie Luciano over Ravena Oliveira(third round submission) and Yousri Belgaroui over Azamat Bekoev (third round TKO).

Dober vs. Prepolec was named fight of the night, while Aoriqileng and Jourdain earned performance bonuses. Attendance for the show was 17,671 and the gate was $2.7 million.





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