UFC Vegas 76: Sean Strickland survives ugly eye poke, batters a gassed Abus Magomedov

Sean Strickland got poked in his eye roughly 30 seconds into his fight against Abus Magomedov at Apex in Las Vegas on Saturday in the main event of UFC Vegas 76. He considered pulling out because he was seeing double. When the fight resumed, he clearly lost the first round.

Magomedov, in his second UFC appearance after winning his debut in 19 seconds, was controlling the bout with his kicks and hands. Strickland didn’t check a lot of them and Magomedov was doing damage.

It was a totally different second round, though. Strickland, ranked seventh at middleweight, let his hands go more at the start of the second round and began walking Magomedov down.

Two minutes into the second, Strickland’s combinations had taken their toll. Magomedov’s nose and cheek area were visibly reddened and he was staggering around the cage trying to find a safe spot.

Strickland, a very solid closer, never got off of him once he had him hurt. He finished it at 4:20 of the second. A multi-punch combination dropped Magomedov, and Strickland pounced on him and finished it with hard shots on the ground. Referee Mark Smith gave Magomedov time to try to halt the onslaught, but Magomedov did little but turtle and Smith stopped it.

Strickland admitted to interviewer Michael Bisping in the Octagon after the fight that he nearly said he couldn’t continue after the eye poke. He said later he was still seeing double.

“Man, I almost got pregnant after that one,” Strickland said. “It was pretty deep, you guys. There’s a coward in me. There was a coward in me that said, ‘Why don’t we just stop this?’ Then I heard you guys over them yelling for me and I was like, ‘We gotta do this s***.’”

And he sure did it.

The second round was all Strickland. He said he knew keeping a fast pace would be a huge factor in his favor.

“Hey, we’ve got five rounds of fun, you guys,” Strickland said. “I ain’t slowing down. I ain’t stopping. You want to go have a good first round, wrestle, do some little pitter patter kicks, bring it. We’ve got two, three, four and five.”