Houston will be the site of UFC 265, set for Saturday night at the Toyota Center. Cyril Gane and Derrick Lewis will meet for the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship. Francis Ngannou refused to defend his belt against Lewis in August, and so the promotion has moved on. The co-main event pits Jose Aldo against Pedro Munhoz in a bantamweight fight, after the slated fight, a UFC Women’s Bantamweight title fight between Amanda Nunes and Julianna Pena was scratched, after Nunes came back positive for COVID-19. Take a look at the full fight card, along with sports betting insights about the key bouts.
UFC 265: Lewis vs Gane Preview
Main Card (Pay Per View)
Derrick Lewis vs Ciryl Gane (UFC Interim Heavyweight Championship)
Jose Aldo vs Pedro Munhoz (Bantamweight)
Michael Chiesa vs Vicente Luque (Welterweight)
Tecia Torres vs Angela Hill (Women’s Strawweight)
Song Yadong vs Casey Kenney (Bantamweight)
Preliminary Card (ESPN2 / ESPN+)
Bobby Green vs Rafael Fiziev (Lightweight)
Vince Morales vs Drako Rodriguez (Bantamweight)
Ed Herman vs Alonzo Menifield (Light Heavyweight)
Karolina Kowakiewicz vs Jessica Penne (Women’s Strawweight)
Early Preliminary Card (ESPN2 / ESPN+ / UFC Fight Pass)
Manel Kape vs Ode Osbourne (Catchweight – 129 lbs)
Miles Johns vs Anderson dos Santos (Bantamweight)
Victoria Leonardo vs Melissa Gatto (Women’s Flyweight)
Johnny Munoz Jr vs Jamey Simmons (Bantamweight)
Derrick Lewis (25-7, 16-5 UFC, +310) vs Ciryl Gane (9-0, 6-0 UFC, -370) has seen the odds move even more in Gane’s direction from the opening moneyline. Lewis got off to a solid start in UFC, delivering big bombs to knock out Jack May and Guto Inocente, but then he dropped fights against Matt Mitrione and Shawn Jordan that showed some fragility. He recovered to win six fights in a row by changing his strategy; instead of constantly heading forward to bring pressure, he opted to wait for the fight to come to him, and things changed dramatically. Some of his fights turned into snoozefests as a result, when both fighters opted to wait for the other, but when he beat Alexander Volkov in 2018, he became the promotion’s newest star. He got a title fight against Daniel Cormier, which turned into a second-round loss, and then he lost to Junior dos Santos. He took some time off for back surgery and then delivered a perfectly timed uppercut to knock out Curtis Blaydes in February. This made him the top contender, and when Ngannou wanted to wait to defend his title until September, the promotion decided to set up this interim bout instead.
Gane has shot up through the heavyweight ranks in UFC. His kickboxing career was impressive enough for UFC to sign him after only three fights, and in his first four months, he beat Raphael Pessoa, Don’Tale Mayes and Tanner Boser, submitting the first two. He lost almost all of 2020 due to cancellation after cancellation thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic; since then, he was able to beat Jairzinho Rozenstruik on the cards and beat Alexander Volkov easily. Gane has more speed and better technique; he is also the stronger grappler and wrestler. In any other division, he’s the easy pick, but in the heavyweight division, there is the possibility of Lewis bringing the big bomb — and here he also brings a ton of value.
Final Prediction:
Lewis wins via knockout
Jose Aldo (29-7, 11-6 UFC, -110) vs Pedro Munhoz (19-5, 9-5 UFC, -110) is Aldo’s latest adventure after his decision to cut to bantamweight. When he was a featherweight, he ruled the classification until Conor McGregor showed up. Even after McGregor faded, Alto dropped two fights against Max Holloway, which suggested that the rest of the classification had figured out a way through him. He was dropped back out of headline bouts, which means he was back to three-round fights, so he had to rediscover his finishing skills. He beat Jeremy Stephens and Renato Carneiro, but then he lost to Alexander Volkanovski, which told him it was time to change divisions. At bantamweight, he has a bit of a size advantage, which he exploited against Marlon Moraes — before taking the loss. He fought Petr Yan for the vacant bantamweight title after Henry Cejudo retired, but Yan finished him; Aldo recovered to beat Marlon Vera in December.
Munhoz built a reputation as a submission artist in his early UFC days, with three guillotine chokes in a run of four straight wins. His strategy was to move forward and deliver volume, relying on his own durability and his opponent’s likeliness of freaking out and going down for a submission, giving him the opening to deliver that guillotine choke. In the past two years, though, he has stagnated a bit, losing to Aljamain Sterling and Frankie Edgar before beating Jimmie Rivera in February. If Aldo can exercise patience and wait for his openings, he can win this, but his style is not defensive enough to make this particularly likely.
Final Prediction:
Munhoz wins via decision
UFC Betting Odds
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