St. Preux-Humphrey Fills Injury Gap at Jan. 7 ‘Challengers’

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Ovince St. Preux will return to the Strikeforce cage for the third time in six weeks when he takes on Ron “Abongo” Humphrey at Strikeforce Challengers 13, which takes place Jan. 7 at Nashville Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tenn.

The light heavyweight scrap will effectively serve as a replacement for a previously-scheduled middleweight attraction between Yancy Medeiros and John Salter, which has been canceled due to a Medeiros knee injury.

The St. Preux-Humphrey fight was first reported by ESPN.com Tuesday morning. Sherdog.com has since confirmed the report with Strikeforce officials, who also disclosed Medeiros’ injury and the cancellation of that bout.

After a 3-4 start to his career, St. Preux went on a tear in 2010. A winner of six straight fights, the former University of Tennessee linebacker is a perfect 3-0 in Strikeforce competition. Though still developing his technical skills, St. Preux has shown marked improvement in each of his Strikeforce outings. He most recently defeated the hard-hitting but undersized Benji Radach by unanimous decision at “Henderson vs. Babalu 2” on Dec. 4.

Humphrey began his career with six straight wins at heavyweight before running into Brett Rogers in his Strikeforce debut last April. After falling to “The Grim,” Humphrey successfully dropped to 205 pounds for his next contest, submitting George Bush via first-round guillotine choke at “Challengers 7.” Most recently, the “Iron Ring” reality show veteran was submitted by King of the Cage light heavyweight champion Mike Kyle at “Challengers 9” in July.

Strikeforce Challengers 13 will be headlined by a welterweight scrap between blue-chip prospects Tyron Woodley and Tarec Saffiedine. The card will also feature a heavyweight bout between Olympic wrestling convert Daniel Cormier and Devin Cole.