UFC 217 results: James Vick keeps rolling, TKOs Joseph Duffy with 1 tick left in second

James Vick kept on rolling Saturday night and wants the kind of name that will make him a contender in the lightweight division.

Vick (12-1 MMA, 8-1 UFC) stopped Joseph Duffy (17-3 MMA, 4-2 UFC) with a TKO with one second left in the second round after planting him with a big right uppercut.

The lightweight bout closed out the preliminary card of today’s UFC 217 event at Madison Square Garden in New York. It aired on FS1 following additional prelims on UFC Fight Pass and ahead of a main card on pay-per-view.

Duffy went to the center early and Vick circled outside. Vick landed a solid kick to the midsection 45 seconds in, but briefly took a seat when Duffy nearly caught it. Vick pushed his jab out a minute in, then countered a Duffy leg kick with one of his own. Vick faked a knee, then threw a right hand that whiffed. A right hand landed for Vick, and an uppercut came right behind it.

But Duffy landed a nice left over the top. Duffy caught a Vick kick and tripped him down, and a Duffy right hand found a home not long after that. With 90 seconds left, Duffy got inside and clinched up wtih Vick, but the two broke off not long after that. With 50 seconds left, Duffy took Vick down, then had to fend off a guillotine attempt.

Duffy worked body kicks in the second and had to stay as far at the end of Vick’s jab as he could. But Vick did well at finding his range, and while he didn’t land anything major for most of the round, he saved his best for the final 10 seconds of the round.

Vick landed a right uppercut that put Duffy on the canvas. Vick dove to the mat to go after him and landed 10 big hammerfists until the referee jumped in to call the fight – a fraction of a second before the horn sounded to end the round.

After the fight, Vick told announcer Joe Rogan he wants to headline the UFC’s “Fight Night” card in Austin, Texas, in February.

Vick won for the third straight time, all by stoppage. Duffy had a two-fight winning streak snapped.

Up-to-the-minute UFC 217 results include:

• James Vick def. Joseph Duffy via TKO (punches) – Round 2, 4:59
• Mark Godbeer def. Walt Harris via disqualification (illegal kick) – Round 1, 4:29
• Ovince Saint Preux def. Corey Anderson via knockout (head kick) – Round 3, 1:25
• Randy Brown def. Mickey Gall via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-27)
• Curtis Blaydes def. Aleksei Oleinik via TKO (doctor’s stoppage) – Round 2, 1:56
• Ricardo Ramos def. Aiemann Zahabi via knockout (spinning back elbow) – Round 3, 1:58

For complete coverage of UFC 217, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

(MMAjunkie’s John Morgan, Mike Bohn, Ken Hathaway and Abbey Subhan contributed to this report on site in New York.)