The time and place of Alexander
Volkanovski vs. Ilia
Topuria is now official.
Per the promotion
on Thursday,
UFC 298 will take place at the Honda Center in Anaheim,
California, on Feb. 17. The Ultimate Fighting Championship had previously
announced that the featherweight championship clash of Volkanovski
(26-3) vs. Topuria (14-0) would sit atop the billing, and its date
of Feb. 17 had been discussed as well. However, the destination of
California was not official until its announcement.
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This event will be the first at this venue since UFC 270 in early
2022, when Francis
Ngannou beat Ciryl Gane
for the heavyweight strap. The home to NHL team Anaheim Ducks has
played host to a number of major UFC cards over the years, from UFC
76 titled “Knockout” which did not feature a single knockout to UFC
157 which brought women’s MMA to the organization. This fight card
will feature the first men’s headliner in a division below light
heavyweight for the building, although the canceled UFC 233 was
slated to have Henry
Cejudo rematch T.J.
Dillashaw for the latter’s bantamweight throne.
Volkanovski will be looking to right the ship after a short-notice
appearance up for the lightweight belt did not go his way in
October. The Aussie attempted to wrest the 155-pound strap from
Islam
Makhachev in his second effort, only to get punted in just over
three minutes. Throughout his career that began in 2012,
Volkanovski has still not lost in any weight class below
lightweight, and he has amassed five defenses as the featherweight
king thus far including two against Max
Holloway, and one against Brian
Ortega, Chan Sung
Jung and Yair
Rodriguez.
“El Matador” Topuria has yet to taste defeat as a professional, and
he has finished 12 of his 14 opponents to date. Inside the Octagon,
the German-born Georgian fighting out of and repping Spain has
rattled off six wins including four stoppages. Topuria cinched his
crack at the belt by running roughshod over Josh Emmett,
with one judge even awarding him a 50-42 scorecard en route to a
dominant triumph. Emmett has put away Bryce
Mitchell, Jai
Herbert, Ryan Hall and
Damon
Jackson in the UFC as well.
With its location of Anaheim in the books, UFC 298 will be going
down on Feb. 17 with at least one championship bout on its lineup
in the form of Volkanovski vs. Topuria at 145 pounds. Only a few
other fights have been added to the billing thus far, including a
heavyweight romp between Marcos
Rogerio de Lima and Justin
Tafa, a welterweight contest pitting Danny
Barlow against Yusaku
Kinoshita and a rescheduled 205-pound tilt of Mingyang
Zhang vs. Brendson
Ribeiro.