The company announced the full card for UFC Fight Night 17 on Feb. 7 in Tampa, Fla., as Joe Lauzon will tackle former lightweight title challenger Hermes Franca in the main event on Spike TV. The other four televised bouts are lined up as follows: Cain Velasquez v. Denis Stojnic, Mac Danzig v. Josh Neer and Amir Sadollah v. Nick Catone. One change to the undercard was made when Alessio Sakara pulled out of a fight with All-American wrestler Jake Rosholt due to injury. Rosholt will now face Dan Miller in his UFC debut.
Meanwhile, Josh Koscheck has verbally agreed to fight UFC newcomer Paulo Thiago at UFC 95 on Feb. 21 in London, according to Brazilian Web site Tatame. Thiago (7-0), who trains with World Extreme Cagefighting bantamweight Rani Yahya, came up in Brazil’s Jungle Fight promotion. UFC 95, expected to be a Spike TV special, will be headlined by Diego Sanchez v. Joe Stevenson. The card will also feature Wilson Gouveia v. Nate Marquardt and Demian Maia v. Chael Sonnen.
For UFC 96 on March 7 in Columbus, Ohio, Dustin Hazelett has signed to face Ben Saunders, while Gabriel Gonzaga v. Shane Carwin has also been confirmed for the event. Four weeks later, a UFC Fight Night 18 card appears penciled in for Nashville, Tenn. “The Ultimate Fighter 8” lightweight winner Efrain Escudero has agreed to face Jeremy Stephens at the April 1 show, according to several reports. Fellow TUF 8 fighter Junie Allen Browning also has agreed to fight against Cole Miller that same day, according to MMAJunkie.
Elsewhere, the company appears to be stocking its planned UFC 97 event on April 18 in Montreal with French Canadians.
One-time middleweight title contender David “The Crow” Loiseau will return to the UFC on the card and told Sherdog.com that he has agreed to face Ed Herman. Another Montreal scrapper, Jonathan Goulet, has been offered a fight with Tamdan McCrory at UFC 97; Goulet told Sherdog.com he needs to have a knee injury cleared by a doctor before he can accept the fight. The event will likely be headlined by Anderson Silva v. Thales Leites for the middleweight title, though UFC President Dana White told ESPN The Magazine’s Web site that he’s working towards Chuck Liddell returning in April against either Mauricio “Shogun” Rua or Wanderlei Silva.