It was ladies’ night when it came to post-fight bonuses at the UFC
Apex in Las Vegas on Saturday, as Marina
Rodriguez, Mackenzie
Dern, Mariya
Agapova and Lupita
Godinez each took home $50,000 checks.
Rodriguez and Dern earned “Fight of the Night” honors for their
five-round strawweight headliner at
UFC Fight Night 194. Rodriguez utilized a multi-faceted
striking arsenal to control the action on the feet, but she had to
survive a couple scary moments on the mat against the Brazilian
jiu-jitsu black belt. Ultimately, Rodriguez was able to avoid
serious danger and emerged with a unanimous decision triumph.
Elsewhere, Agapova received a “Performance of the Night” award on
the strength of a submission win against Sabina Mazo
at flyweight. Agapova controlled the range with her striking
throughout the fight before dropping her adversary with a crushing
right hand to the jaw in the third round. From there, Agapova
wasted little time jumping on Mazo’s back and locking in a
rear-naked choke for a submission win 53 seconds into the
period.
Finally, Lupita
Godinez garnered the card’s other “Peformance of the Night”
bonus by making short work of the debuting Silvana
Gomez Juarez in a preliminary strawweight affair. Godinez
landed multiple takedowns in the opening stanza before taking
Juarez’s back and transitioning to an armbar for a tapout 4:14 into
Round 1.