Katlyn Cerminara, née Chookagian, could not defend her top five ranking at flyweight against rising contender Maycee Barber in Miami.
Barber came into the fight on a winning streak of five, with her most recent fight being her best, a violent ‘Performance of the Night’ finish over Amanda Ribas. Cerminara returned to face her after a year off since a loss to Manon Fiorot which ended Katlyn’s four-fight winning streak. With a ten year age gap between them, this fight represented a passing of the torch from her to Maycee ‘the Future’ Barber.
Maycee came out swinging hard to start the bout which prompted a takedown attempt from Cerminara, that Barber defended. Cerminara was able to control Barber in the clinch for a long period, showing Maycee’s inexperience there, though Barber hurt her on the break, and again after sprawling out Katlyn’s next takedown attempt. Cerminara may have even hurt herself from hitting her head on the canvas when that attempt got sprawled on. The first round had some wild exchanges in the pocket, most of which Maycee landed the bigger strikes in, giving her a likely 10-9 lead after five minutes.
The second round started with Barber doing well but then getting hit by a clean right hand when she got overconfident. Cerminara used sideways movement to get out of the way of many wild blitzes from her foe, who wanted to get on the inside and make the fight messy. Katlyn did a better job of avoiding that in the second round, keeping her distance with good footwork. Maycee still had some lands, but less so. With two minutes left Barber got her first takedown from the clinch, but Cerminara bounced right back up. Still, ‘the Future’ gained the rear body-lock from that exchange, which she held onto for almost a minute and landed some decent strikes with. She held onto the clinch most of the rest of the round, making it close going into the final frame.
Barber blitzed to start round three but Cerminara turned the tables by smothering her with the clinch and shooting a takedown, which failed. They both had moments, but Maycee had a big one with three hooks that connected on wild swings ninety seconds into the round. Barber then clinched up and after a minute got a takedown, but Katlyn used a leg entanglement to create a scramble and get back up. Cerminara did good things with her straight shots, but Barber just landed harder, from her body kicks to her hooks. She landed a takedown with ten seconds left, that Cerminara got right back up from, and the pair swung in the pocket for the last few seconds.
After a competitive fight, the decision was read out by Bruce Buffer. The judges awarded the winner unanimously, giving it to Maycee Barber, with two of them giving her all three rounds. Now on a six-fight winning streak, Barber likely is only one more win away from her first UFC title shot.
Official Result: Maycee Barber def. Katlyn Cerminara by Unanimous Decision (30-27, 30-27, 29-28)
