UFC Vegas 76 Results – Strickland Edges Closer to a Title Fight

The UFC Vegas 76 Results are in for review. A great night of action on a seemingly underwhelming card on the surface. However, a few great performances put fight fans on notice when Sean Strickland faced Abus Magomedov in the main event. It all went down live on Saturday July 1, 2023 from the UFC APEX in Las Vegas, NV and aired live on ESPN & ESPN+.

Main Event

In the main event, Sean Strickland #7 took on a dangerous middleweight in Abus Magomedov. Sean Strickland lost a close split decision loss to Jared Cannonier in December of 2022. Since then, Strickland has been keeping himself busy in the UFC fighting only a month after that loss in January of this year when he earned a win over Nassourdine Imavov.

Abus Magomedov came into the UFC in September of last year and quickly dispatched his opponent in his debut, via 1st round KO. Though this was to be only his second fight in the UFC, Magomedov had a list of MMA accomplishments from other fight venues which includes the PFL.

The fight nearly ended before it really got going as an unintentional eye poke from Abus Magomedov had Strickland wondering if he could continue. After he took a few minutes to recover Strickland stepped back in (as the warrior he is) to complete the match.

The first round was Magomedov’s best, but Strickland came to fight five rounds where Magomedov didn’t appear to leave enough in the gas tank to carry him through two. Body kicks, head kicks and takedowns were all on the menu for Magomedov and Strickland kept with his unique boxing style and remained calm even though he possibly gave Magomedov the first round.

In the second round, Strickland began to find a home for his punches. Halfway through the round, Magomedov looked gassed and kept covering, however, Strickland was landing through his guard. With under a minute left Strickland started to pour on the pressure and dropped his opponent with a right hand and stayed on him forcing the referee to stop the fight earning Strickland the win by TKO.

Co-main Event

The co-main event of UFC Vegas 76 was in lightweight division, where #12 Damir Ismagulov took on UFC contender #15 Grant Dawson. The two ranked contenders looked to implement very different game plans. Grant Dawson looked to take the fight to the mat and Ismagulov appeared to wish to keep it striking. It was Dawson however, who appeared to implement his game plan more effectively.

Dawson wasted no time in getting the back of his opponent and quickly securing a body triangle. To Ismagulov’s credit, he would not give in to Dawson’s submission attempts and defended well for having Dawson on his back for well over half of the entire fight.

In the end it was Dawson who secured the unanimous decision victory to the surprise of no one. All three judges awarded the fight to Dawson 30-27. This will put Grant Dawson in front of some of the top talent the UFC has to offer in his upcoming matches.

UFC VEGAS 76 RESULTS

MAIN CARD (AIRED ON ESPN & ESPN+ AT 6:00PM CDT)

• Sean Strickland #7 (27-5-0), (-170) vs Abus Magomedov (25-5-1), (+145) – middleweight bout – Strickland by 2nd round TKO – Performance of the night
• Damir Ismagulov #12 (24-2-0), (-145) vs Grant Dawson #15 (20-1-1), (+125) – lightweight bout – Dawson by unanimous decision
• Max Griffin (19-10-0), (+170) vs Michael Morales (15-0-0), (-200) – welterweight bout – Morales by unanimous decision
• Ariane Lipski (16-8-0), (+140) vs Melissa Gatto (8-1-2), (-165) – women’s flyweight bout – Lipski by split decision
• Ismael Bonfim (19-4-0), (-285) vs Benoit Saint-Denis (11-1-0), (+240) – lightweight bout – Saint Denis by first round submission
• Brunno Ferreira (10-1-0), (+140) vs Nursulton Ruziboev (35-8-2), (-165) – middleweight bout – Ruziboev by 1st round KO

PRELIMS (AIRED ON ESPN & ESPN+ AT 3:00PM CDT)

• Kevin Lee (18-8-0), (+190) vs Rinat Fkhretdinov (21-1-0), (-225) – welterweight bout – Fakhretdinov by 1st round submission
• Joanderson Brito (15-3-1) vs Westin Wilson (16-8-0) – featherweight bout – Brito by 1st round KO/TKO
• Yana Santos (14-8-0) vs Karol Rosa #9 (17-5-0) – women’s featherweight bout – Rosa by split decision
• Guram Kutateladze (12-4-0) vs Elves Brener (15-3-0) – lightweight – Brener by 3rd round KO/TKO – fight of the night
• Ivana Petrovic (6-1-0) vs Luana Carolina (9-4-0) – women’s flyweight bout – Carolina by unanimous decision
• Alexandr Romanov (16-2-0) vs Blagoy Ivanov #15 (19-6-0) – heavyweight bout – Romanov by unanimous decision

That wraps it up for the UFC Fight Night Vegas 76 results. If you enjoyed this article and want to see more of our UFC MMA action (and we certainly hope you do), follow the link. Check back with us for the next UFC Saturday, July 8th, 2023 when the UFC heads to the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas for UFC 290. The unification of the featherweight title will headline the event and even the flyweight belt will be up for grabs in the co-main event.