Preview: UFC Fight Night 220 Prelims

The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s latest card from the UFC Apex comes with the typical solid slate of prelims and showcases some interesting if unproven talent on Saturday in Las Vegas. The featured UFC Fight Night 220 prelim sees what might be the most intriguing newcomer of the bunch, as Brazilian flyweight Gabriella Fernandes Hermogenes draws a stern test in her promotional debut against Jasmine Jasudavicius. Beyond that, Charles Johnson keeps up a torrid pace of bookings in a late-notice scrap against Ode Osbourne, and highly touted Tajik lightweight Nurullo Aliev looks to cash in on his hype against Rafael Alves.

Now to the preview for the UFC Fight Night 220 prelims:

Women’s Flyweights

Gabriella Fernandes Hermogenes (8-1, 0-0 UFC) vs. Jasmine Jasudavicius (7-2, 1-1 UFC)

ODDS: Hermogenes (-125), Jasudavicius (+105)

Flyweight has quietly become the UFC’s deepest division on the women’s side, and these two talents are each looking to carve out a niche. Canada’s Jasudavicius is an interesting fighter to track. A late-comer to the sport, she cuts an impressive frame for the division and has developed a solidly well-rounded game given her relative inexperience. With that said, she does not leverage her size particularly well, at least in terms of using her reach. By default, Jasudavicius would much rather march down her opponents and win a grimy fight, often breaking out a wrestling game that looks impressive when she can get the ball rolling. However, her last loss to Natalia Silva showed that things can go south given the wrong stylistic matchup. It was an unexpected breakout for Silva, who nullified her size disadvantage with a speedy striking approach that made Jasudavicius look plodding as a result. She looks to rebound here against another Brazilian newcomer, this time facing Hermogenes. Like Jasudavicius, “Gabi” pops as having a long frame for the division but leverages that advantage much better with a kick-heavy striking game, backed up with a grappling background in case things wind up heading into closer quarters. Hermogenes is a clear physical talent, so it is just a matter of how she continues to develop while possessing some impressive tools and handles some rare size parity. In particular, it would be nice to see her overcome some of the slow starts that have marked her last two wins, both of which were finishes where she turned up the heat in the second round. Overall, this seems to be Hermogenes’ fight to lose, given that she is the clearly faster fighter while also being able to nullify Jasudavicius’ usual reach advantage. The pick is Hermogenes via decision.

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Hermogenes vs. Jasudavicius
Martinez vs. Leavitt
Johnson vs. Osbourne
Solecki vs. Deaton
Aliev vs. Alves
Cowan vs. Perez
Armfield vs. Johnson