We’re back with another Today in MMA History article. Since COVID-19 has canceled most MMA events, MMASucka has decided to take a look at some fights from the past. Today’s article takes a look back at the UFC’s first fight card in Canada, UFC 83, and the main event fight for the welterweight championship. That’s right, we are talking about Georges St-Pierre taking on Matt Serra in a rematch that the entire MMA world was watching.
Twelve years ago today, the roof came off the Bell Centre in Montreal when @GeorgesStPierre was introduced at UFC 83 ? pic.twitter.com/rLBl32Q7G4
— ESPN MMA (@espnmma) April 19, 2020
April 19, 2008- Georges St-Pierre vs. Matt Serra 2
St-Pierre vs. Serra 2 was the rematch that fight fans needed to have. Serra defeated St-Pierre back at UFC 69 earning himself the UFC welterweight championship and handing St-Pierre his second career loss. St-Pierre would go on to defeat Josh Koscheck and Matt Hughes (for the interim welterweight championship) after the loss to set himself up for the highly anticipated rematch against Serra.
Serra didn’t fight anyone after defeating St-Pierre and earning the championship. In fact, he was supposed to fight Hughes after a heated season of the Ultimate Fighter but due to a back injury that Serra had, the fight was postponed and St-Pierre ended up fighting Hughes.
The rematch started with St-Pierre going for a takedown right away. Clearly, he wasn’t interested in standing and banging with Serra at all. The entire first round was controlled by St-Pierre, he spent most of the round in top control raining down punches. The second round started out much like the first with St-Pierre taking Serra to the mat right away. The top control of GSP turned out to be too much for Serra to handle. Finally, a flurry of knees to the body of Serra while he was on the mat, causing referee Yves Lavigne to call a stop to the fight at 4:45 of the second round. Making St-Pierre the undisputed UFC welterweight champion once again.
After the Fight
After his loss to St-Pierre, Serra moved on to fight Matt Hughes at UFC 98 where he lost a decision. He would then go on to defeat Frank Trigg at UFC 109 but he would eventually lose the last fight of his career back at UFC 119 against Chris Lytle. Serra now runs a successful BJJ school in New Jersey and trains a hand full of UFC superstars today.
St-Pierre carried on his legendary career after defeating Serra and had one of the best welterweight championships runs in the UFC history. He would go on to defeat the likes of B.J. Penn, Jon Fitch, Jake Shields, and Nick Diaz. After defeating Johny Hendricks in 2013 GSP took some time off, not coming back until 2017 where he defeated Micheal Bisping at UFC 217 to once again become the welterweight champion. We have not seen GSP in cation since his win over Bisping, there have been some rumors floating around that a super fight against Khabib Nurmagomedov could possibly happen, but the chances of that coming together is very slim.
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