Cortney Casey hopes Jessica Aguilar 'sticks to her Mexican ways' at UFC 211

DALLAS – Cortney Casey has no time for dilly dallying in her MMA career. Her lone goal is to fight the best competition available with hope of eventually claiming a world title, but she refuses to accept any easy fights on the way there.

A glance at her schedule proves she’s not lying. Casey (6-4 MMA, 2-3 UFC) is coming off a unanimous decision loss to former UFC strawweight title challenger Claudia Gadelha at UFC Fight Night 100 this past November, only to turn around and accept a UFC 211 bout with former WSOF champ Jessica Aguilar (19-5 MMA, 0-1 UFC).

The matchup with Aguilar, which serves as the featured bout on UFC 211’s early UFC Fight Pass-streamed prelims prior to FX prelims and the pay-per-view main card at American Airlines Center in Dallas on Saturday, serves as more evidence of Casey’s approach.

“They just come to me,” Casey told MMAjunkie. “(UFC matchmaker) Sean Shelby gives me a call, gives me a name, and I say yes 99 percent of the time – so he knows who to call. … I don’t want any easy fights. I don’t want any hand-picked fights. I’m here to do my job, and my job is to fight and fight the top fighters – and that’s what I’m here to do.”

Although Casey has fallen short in some of her most notable bouts thus far, she said the results don’t deter her from accepting lofty challenges. Aguilar, No. 3 in the latest USA TODAY Sports/MMAjunkie MMA strawweight rankings, has been near the top of her division for the past several years, and Casey said she relishes the chance to fight her.

“We’re here to fight the best, we’re not here to have sandbag fights and hand-picked fights,” Casey said. “We’re here to fight, and if you want to be the champ you have to fight the best. That’s the only way you’re going to get there. I think the fastest road to that is to fight top-10 fighters, top-15 fighters, regardless of if you’re ranked or not. When those hard fights come, it really shows who you are, what your character is.”

If there’s any point in time for someone like Casey to take advantage of a highly ranked foe like Aguilar, it’s now. “Jag” hasn’t competed in nearly two years since she lost her UFC debut to Gadelha at UFC 190 in August 2015. The layoff was caused by an ACL tear, a significant injury that required surgery.

At 35 and with such a long break, it’s difficult to determine whether Aguilar will return to competition as her best self. Casey prepared for the sharpest version of the American Top Team product, and she hopes Aguilar will live up to her Mexican heritage and come prepared for a slugfest.

“I still feel like she’s going to be really aggressive, a lot of head movement, and obviously she’s going to rely heavily on her right hand, like usual,” Casey said. “From watching the Claudia fight, she’s going to wrestle a little bit. I hope she doesn’t – I hope she sticks to her Mexican ways. She claims to be a Mexican-style fighter, so hopefully she goes to the center of the cage and we get to bang.”

For more on UFC 211, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.