[ad_1]
The Ultimate Fighter is gearing up for another season of drama with rivals Alexa Grasso and Valentina Shevchenko at the helm.
Tuesday’s premiere not only marked the 32nd season of the long-running reality series, it is also the 20th anniversary of TUF, which began taping in 2004 (and later aired its first episode in January 2005). To commemorate the occasion and UFC’s global expansion, TUF 32 features not only a pair of star coaches born outside of the United States in Mexico’s Grasso and Kyrgyzstan’s Shevchenko, but a 16-fighter cast representing 14 different countries.
Episode 1 begins with the coaches evaluating a roster of middleweights and featherweights before selecting their teams. Grasso wins a coin toss that allows her to make the first selection (meaning Shevchenko will pick the first two fights) and she goes with countryman Guillermo Torres as her first featherweight pick.
For her first middleweight pick, Grasso selects Switzerland’s Robert Valentin. Shevchenko jokes that Grasso stole one of her fighters as she has trained with Valentin at Tiger Muay Thai. Shevchenko’s first picks are South Africa’s Roedie Roets and Russia’s Shamidkhan Magomedov.
See how the team rosters ended up below.
Team Grasso
Featherweights
- Guillermo Torres (Mexico) (7-1)
- Kaan Ofli (Australia) (10-2-1)
- Bekhzod Usmonov (Tajikistan) (11-4)
- Mairon Santos (Brazil) (13-1)
Middleweights
- Robert Valentin (Switzerland) (10-3)
- Paddy McCorry (Ireland) (4-1)
- Omran Chaaban (Finland) (6-1)
- Tom Theocharis (Canada) (9-5)
Team Shevchenko
Featherweights
- Roedie Roets (South Africa) (7-1)
- Zygimantas Ramaska (Lithuania) (9-2)
- Nathan Fletcher (England) (8-1)
- Edwin Cooper Jr. (USA) (6-1)
Middleweights
- Shamidkhan Magomedov (Russia) (7-1)
- Mark Hulme (South Africa) (12-3)
- Ryan Loder (USA) (6-1)
- Giannis Bachar (Greece) (9-2)
Following the team selections, Shevchenko dubs her squad “Team Bullet” and hands out a bullet to each of her fighters, as well as UFC CEO Dana White.
The first matchup of the season falls in Shevchenko’s hands and she selects her No. 1 featherweight Roedie Roets to fight Grasso’s No. 1 pick Guillermo Torres. It promises to be a battle of wrestlers, with Roets favoring his grappling and Torres having wrestled at the 2012 London Olympics.
After two competitive rounds that sees both fighters have their chance to work from top position, a tense third is decided by the larger Roets landing better punches in the standup and on the ground. Torres — 10 years Roets’ senior at 37 — appears to gas out in the final round, opening the door for Roets to pull ahead on the scorecards.
With the win, Shevchenko takes a 1-0 advantage in her TUF 32 coaching matchup against Grasso, the UFC’s reigning flyweight champion. Grasso has the edge in her two-fight series with Shevchenko, having submitted her at UFC 285 and then narrowly escaping with a split draw in their rematch at Noche UFC.
Shevchenko also picks the first middleweight fight, which takes place next week. Her No. 1 pick Shamidkhan Magomedov takes on Grasso’s No. 3 pick Omran Chaaban.
The Ultimate Fighter 32 airs live every Tuesday at 10 p.m. ET on ESPN+.
Following the season finale, Alexa Grasso and Valentina Shevchenko are expected to face off in a flyweight championship trilogy bout at a date still to be determined.
The finalists of the TUF 32 middleweight and featherweight tournaments will also compete for a six-figure UFC contract at the show’s live finale. A date for that event is also yet to be announced.
Here are the quarterfinal results so far:
Roedie Roets def. Guillermo Torres via decision
Advancing to semifinals: Roets
Eliminated: Torres
[ad_2]
Source link
