UFC Fight Night 79 results: Seo Hee Ham edges shocked Cortney Casey

Seo Hee Ham

SEOUL – Seo Hee Ham was the clear crowd favorite, but opponent Cortney Casey had the slight edge at the sports books and possibly in the cage. But it didn’t earn her a victory.

Casey (4-3 MMA, 0-2 UFC) scored a few key takedowns and survived a late rally from Ham (16-6 MMA, 1-1 UFC). However, Ham ended up earning the unanimous-decision victory.

The women’s strawweight bout was part of the preliminary card of today’s UFC Fight Night 79 event at Olympic Gymnastics Arena in Seoul. It streamed on UFC Fight Pass.

The fighters traded early shots, and both landed some heavy punches. Ham was the aggressor, but Casey’s stiff right found a consistent home. She then landed a solid head kick and chased with a series of follow-up punches (via Twitter):

Ham, though, survived and fired back, but a patient Casey avoided anything substantial and mixed in some solid combos before a round-ending firefight.

In the second round, Casey clipped and dropped Ham, but the durable Korean quickly returned to her feet and seemed no worse for the wear. After brief timeouts when Casey took an accidental eye-poke and later a low kick to the groin, she continued to keep distance with kicks and avoided the lunging shots from her shorter opponent.

By the third round, Casey knew she had to change the momentum of the fight. She quickly swarmed, ate a counter, but landed a few big punches while her opponent was pinned against the cage. After she circled away, Ham walked her down and continued looking for the knockout. Ham was the far more active fighter as the fight came to a close, and it likely swayed the judges.

In the end, Ham got the win via 29-28 scores across the board, which seemingly came as a shock to a frustrated Casey.

With her 16th pro win and first in the UFC, Ham is now on a 7-1 run. Casey drops her second straight.

Up-to-the-minute UFC Fight Night 79 results include:

• Seo Hee Ham def. Cortney Casey via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)
• Fredy Serrano def. Yao Zhikui via TKO (arm injury) – Round 1, 0:44
• Marco Beltran def. Ning Guangyou via split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
• Dominique Steele def. Dong Hyun Kim via knockout (slam) – Round 3, 0:27

For complete coverage of UFC Fight Night 79, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

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