UFC Fight Night 67 results: Juliana Lima coasts past gritty Ericka Almeida

Juliana Lima

GOIANIA, Brazil – Juliana Lima may not have thrilled the crowd with her unanimous decision victory over Ericka Almeida, but she did remind that she’s not a foe to be taken lightly.

The women’s strawweight bout was part of the preliminary card of today’s UFC Fight Night 67 event at Goiania Arena in Goiania, Goias, Brazil. It streamed on UFC Fight Pass ahead of additional prelims and a main card on FOX Sports 1.

Almeida (7-1 MMA, 0-1 UFC) was quick to try for a head and arm takedown and Lima (8-2 MMA, 2-1 UFC) attempted to roll through, resulting in a struggle for position on the ground. Lima used a reverse triangle grip to push through the position to end up on top in Almeida’s guard. Lima kept safe positions once inside the guard and worked some strong punches and elbows.

Almeida looked to scramble out of position and almost ended up in a heel hook for her trouble before ending up right back with Lima in her guard where she would finish Round 1.

It took less than 15 seconds in Round 2 before Lima put Almeida on her back and went back to her safe ground and pound strategy. Lima’s strategy wasn’t thrilling, but was effective as Almeida was forced to repeatedly throw her legs up in a futile attempt to catch an arm or a triangle choke.

With roughly 50 seconds left in the round the referee stood the women back up where Lima pushed Almeida to the cage with a Thai clinch before the round ended.

Almeida had the opportunity to try and get some work done on the feet in Round 3 with the action staying on the feet for an extended period of time. Almeida landed a crisp right hand but that was all she did before Lima scored with a takedown and put the fight right back in her realm.

The judges gave the fight to the obvious winner, Juliana Lima, but there was one surprising scorecard turned in as the scores read 30-27, 30-27 and 30-25.

Lima came into the fight having rebounded from a loss to current UFC women’s straight champion Joanna Jedrzejczyk in her octagon debut by beating Nina Ansaroff by unanimous decision. The fight was Almeida’s first in the UFC and her first career loss.

Up-to-the-minute UFC Fight Night 67 results include:

For complete coverage of UFC Fight Night 67, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

(MMAjunkie’s John Morgan contributed to this report on site in Brazil.)