ROC 33 was a great event. Here is a recap of the fights that I remember :
Here is a link to the results : http://www.sherdog.com/events/ROC-33-Ring-of-Combat-33-14260
Some fights that I remember were :
Marcos Loro vs Ryan Vaccaro – I was so happy to see such a dominating performance by my coach Loro. Vaccaro is a very tough fighter, and has good hands as well as good wrestling and I think is a purple belt in bjj. Loro was landing flying knees, hard hooks and uppercuts, landing takedowns and going for submissions and strong GNP the whole fight. Vaccaro is tough as nails and was not giving up. Loro won by unanimous decision.
Justine Kish vs. Munah Holland – This fight was really entertaining, the women rarely have boring fights, and these two girls went at it like animals! Justine was more of a standup fighter, while Tiger Shullman’s Munah kept going for the clinch and takedowns. Justine used some spinning elbows, and some unsucceful wall-walks to defend takedowns. Eventually, Justine secured a tight triangle from the bottom.
Costantinous Philippou vs Aung La Nsang- My friends who came early told me to watch out for Aung’s kicks, that his standup looked real sharp. As soon as the fight started, Aung threw 2 beautiful high kicks before getting dropped with a punch. Philippou leaped on him and threw hammer fists before the ref stepped in at just 11 seconds of R1, but Aung was not happy with the stoppage at all.
Sean Santella vs Mikey Lovato – I trained a few times with Sean, and he has real good grappling. He immidietly took Mikey down, and was throwing submission after submission. Lovato, at 125 lbs, has very short limbs, so he was able to sneak out of some tight submissions until eventually he had to tap to a very tight armbar. Sean became champ at 125 in ROC.
George Sheppard vs Joseph Aviles – This was an entertaining fight, after some standup exchanges Shepperd and Aviles both landed punches simultaneously, and although Sheppards looked to be the stronger punch, he came on the recieving end of a beautiful knockout.
Danilo Cherman vs Justin Haskins – I trained with danilo for a while, he was an instructor for Vitor Shaolin until he moved to Connecticut to become head BJJ coach for Lions Den there. In the first round, Danilo was winning the fight, landing some nice takedowns and strikes, until the last 20 or so seconds. He was walking back, stumbled and fell, and Haskins pounced on him, almost knocking him out. Danilo has a heart of a lion, and continued fighting, losing a very close decision — in my opinion because of that slip.
The afterparty in Providence of Tropicana was sick! The stories for that are for another blog however..