Two years after being stripped of his championship, Dominick Cruz regained the title he never lost in the ring.
The wonderfully talented but injury-prone San Diego native had fought only once in the past four years due to knee and groin injuries, which in early 2014 necessitated the removal of the UFC bantamweight belt he won in 2010.
However, Cruz (21-1) put on a superlative performance in Boston on Sunday night, winning a split decision from T.J. Dillashaw of Angels Camp, California, to regain the title. The judges’ scores were 48-47 and 49-46 for Cruz and 49-46 for Dillashaw.
“No one is retiring me except for me, I’ve been through too much,” said Cruz, who is 11-0 at 135 pounds.
After a close first round, Cruz turned on the heat in the second and third, using superior footwork and movement. Dillashaw airballed strike after strike as Cruz landed brutal counters.
By the fourth, though, Dillashaw (12-3) began landing body and leg kicks, which cut down on Cruz’s motion. While it was enough to make the fight close, it wasn’t enough to sway the decision in Dillashaw’s favor.
“I’m very disappointed,” Dillashaw said. “Thought I was aggressor, pushed the pace, controlled the shots. That’s the way it is.”
On the preliminary card, Ed “Short Fuse” Herman used a clean right knee to the chin to score a second-round technical knockout of Maine native Tim Boetsch in a light heavyweight bout.
The win improved Herman’s record to 24-11 with one no contest overall, 10-7 in the UFC. Boetsch — a native of Lincolnville and graduate of Camden-Rockport High School in Rockport — fell to 18-10 overall and 9-9 against UFC competition after absorbing his third consecutive loss and sixth defeat in his last eight contests.
The decisive knee came as the combatants were locked in a clinch away from the Octagon wall, one of the few times Herman and Boetsch came together during a bout that otherwise was largely a striking duel.
Boetsch immediately fell to the mat, and as Herman prepared to throw follow-up strikes, veteran New England referee Kevin MacDonald stepped in and stopped the contest at 1:39 of the second round.
On the main card, a battle of former lightweight champions went down to the wire, as former Bellator titleholder Eddie Alvarez of Philadelphia squared off with former UFC and WEC kingpin Anthony Pettis of Milwaukee.
Pettis (18-4) won a clear round two and Alvarez a clear round three. So the decision hinged on a close round one. Two judges saw it for Alvarez, who controlled the pace with his wrestling, giving him a split-decision victory. Alvarez (27-4) got two out of three 29-28 scores for his second consecutive win.
The heavyweight fight between Travis Browne (18-3-1) of Glendale, California, and Matt Mitrione (9-5) of Springfield, Illinois, got ugly when locally assigned referee Gary Foreman let it get out of control.
Browne landed a pair of fight-altering, brutal eye pokes over the first two rounds, grounds for anything from a point deduction to a disqualification. However, Foreman issued no penalties, and Browne capitalized for a third-round TKO. Foreman compounded his mistakes by letting Mitrione take a lot of damage to the injured right eye before waving the bout off at 4:09.
Francisco Trinaldo (17-4) got the main card started with a methodical performance. The 37-year-old from Brasilia, Brazil, out slugged the tough Ross Pearson (18-10, 1 NC) in a hard-hitting lightweight showdown. Trinaldo scored a unanimous decision, earning two 30-27 scorecards from the judges and a 29-28.