Tim Boetsch and Costa Philippou are both looked to move one step closer to a middleweight title shot.
The first round saw Boetsch stalk Philippou almost the entire time. He threw some nice combo’s and a couple well timed takedowns to take the round, the only shot Philippou had was a beautiful uppercut while Boetsch was pressing forward. Boetsch finished the round with a nice front kick.
Philippou opened up Boetsch in the second with a so-called head-butt. An eye poke stopped action mid-way through the second round when Philippou caught Boetsch with an accidental eye poke. Philippou ended the round landing punches and elbows from the half-guard position.
The round begins and Philippou ended up in Boetsch guard. Philippou allowed the bloody Boetsch to get to his feet and then took it back to the mat. Again Philippou backed away and let Boetsch get back to his feet. He ended up back on the ground and pounded his way to a TKO stoppage.
Following the bout, Philippou spoke about his TKO victory.
“I expected to win this fight, but not like this. I made a few rookie mistakes in letting him take me down, but once we started trading blows back and forth later in the fight I had him. I was eventually able to get the better of him in the striking game and have the fight stopped. My teammate, Chris Weidman, was supposed to have this fight originally, but he was injured. Fortunately, I was ready and figured that it might as well be a teammate who replaced him and it all worked out in the end.”
