Luana Carolina outclassed Lucie Pudilova to a decision win in the second fight of the night at UFC Vegas 94.
Carolina came into the fight on the best run of her UFC career, having won two fights convincingly in a row, one by finish. With a 5-3 promotional record in tow, she faced the Czech Republic’s Pudilova. Lucie is 1-2 in this, her second stint with the UFC, but most agree she deserved the decision two fights ago against Joselyne Edwards. Either way, she knew coming in that if she lost to her Brazilian opponent she would be in danger of losing her job, but that did not matter to Carolina.
When the fight began Carolina initially danced around the outside as Pudilova stalked her, but more and more Luana began to sit down on her punches as the round went on. Halfway through the round Lucie’s face was red. She tried to clinch up and perhaps wrestle but Carolina defended and sliced open her foe’s eye on the break with an elbow. Luana then clinched up herself but was unable to get the takedown, but she still hurt Pudilova with dirty boxing and another elbow, although the Czech fighter landed a takedown in the final five seconds to end the round on top.
Carolina picked up where she left off when round two started, controlling the distance with kicks and damaging Pudilova with punches. Lucie landed a good left of her own one minute in, however, and Luana clinched up, then landed yet another slicing elbow on the break. For the rest of the round Carolina won the striking and attacked with her Muay Thai clinch skills whenever in the clinch. Pudilova shot a late takedown which was stuffed but did allow her to land a hard elbow of her own. In the end, it would be Pudilova’s best round.
Round three was largely more of the same. Carolina outstruck Pudilova for the entire round, relying even more on kicks this round, which her opponent had no answer for. Pudilova was game until the end, aggressively going forward and trying to find answers in both the wrestling and striking, but she had none. Even her takedown with one minute left was not enough, as she could not do much damage on top, whereas Luana had been doing damage for the preceding four minutes.
When the judges’ scorecards were read there were no surprises, as all three judges scored the bout for Carolina, one of them giving her all three rounds.
Official Result: Luana Carolina def. Lucie Pudilova by Unanimous Decision (29-28, 29-28, 30-27)
