Preview: UFC Fight Night 229 Prelims

The Ultimate Fighting Championship’s return from a rare off week will see a strong set of UFC Fight Night 229 prelims on Saturday at the UFC Apex in Las Vegas. In the featured spot, former women’s strawweight title challenger Karolina Kowalkiewicz looks to continue her surprising career resurgence against Diana Belbita at 115 pounds. Top prospect Mateus Mendonca makes an interesting cut to flyweight to take on Nathan Maness further down the card, and even the opener provides some intrigue, with women’s flyweight overachievers Montana De La Rosa and J.J. Aldrich each hunting an impressive victory.

Now to the preview for the UFC Fight Night 229 prelims:

Women’s Strawweights

#15 WSW | Karolina Kowalkiewicz (15-7, 8-7 UFC) vs. Diana Belbita (15-7, 2-3 UFC)

ODDS: Kowalkiewicz (-162), Belbita (+136)

The Kowalkiewicz renaissance has been a fun subplot of the last year and a half. Kowalkiewicz quickly rose through the strawweight ranks with a game that was more than the sum of its parts. She did not pop as an athlete or have a particularly smooth technical game, but her combination of durability and persistence got her enough wins to earn a title shot less than a year into her UFC career. Kowalkiewicz hung around the title picture a bit longer, but a 2018 knockout to Jessica Andrade started what looked like a career-ending spiral for her. A five-fight losing streak saw her fight with less aggression and get outworked by some better athletes, along with suffering a career-threatening eye injury in a one-sided loss to Xiaonan Yan. It was a bit of a shock when Kowalkiewicz regrouped and returned after a year off to face Felice Herrig in 2022, but the changes she made have clearly paid off. She is not back to her peak form but now clearly has her confidence back, adding in some focus on her wrestling and grappling that even earned her a submission win over Herrig. Kowalkiewicz has since chugged along with wins over Silvana Gomez Juarez and Vanessa Demopoulos, and she has the once-unthinkable chance to rack up four straight victories here against Belbita. Romania’s Belbita has overachieved to make it this far in her UFC career, given how she looked upon signing with the promotion in 2019. A raw brawler who figured to flame out in short order, Belbita has been fighting with some surprising thought and consistency since relocating to Canada in search of better training. There are still a lot of kinks to work out, as Belbita still tends to give back a lot of her offensive gains on defense, but she at least looks good enough to keep her spot on the roster and continue learning on the job, which was far from a guarantee a few years ago. It is not unthinkable that Belbita’s tall frame and willingness to throw out offense is enough to dissuade Kowalkiewicz from getting much done, but her takedown and grappling defense remain a concern even with her recent improvements. As long as Kowalkiewicz’s rediscovered confidence holds up, she should be able to find plenty of success once she marches through Belbita’s offense. The pick is Kowalkiewicz via first-round submission.

Jump To »
Kowalkiewicz vs. Belbita
Aori vs. Munoz Jr.
Murata vs. Demopoulos
Mendonca vs. Maness
De La Rosa vs. Aldrich