UFC 218 results: Cardio pays dividends for Tecia Torres in decision win over Michelle Waterson

Tecia Torres muscled Michelle Waterson around the cage for three rounds, closing out their meeting with a heavy dose of ground and pound.

Torres (10-1 MMA, 6-1 UFC) took home a unanimous decision over Waterson (14-6 MMA, 2-2 UFC) with scores of 30-27 and 29-28 twice.

The women’s strawweight bout opened up the main card of today’s UFC 218 event at the new Little Caesars Arena in downtown Detroit. It aired on pay-per-view following prelims on FS1 and UFC Fight Pass.

It didn’t take long for Torres to establish physical dominance over Waterson, whose size disadvantage became apparent when the two grappled. The crafty Waterson timed a headlock takedown and hopped on Torres’ back, only to lose the position. Torres then bullied Waterson to the fence, working short shots inside, and ended the opening frame with a flurry of punches.

Seeking to avoid that scenario in the second, Waterson waited for Torres to overextend and nabbed a takedown. On the mat, she managed to fight off reversal attempts, but struggled to put together any offense. Even from the bottom, Torres was able to muscle Waterson around.

In the final frame, Waterson landed a few nice right hands. But Torres simply ate them and returned fire with her own shots. When Waterson slippped on a front kick, Torres hopped into back control and wound up in back mount when a reversal attempt failed. Torres flurried with punches as Waterson floundered helplessly, suggesting an imminent finish. Waterson managed to get back to her feet, only to be chased across the cage with a final salvo of punches.

Torres now has won three straight in the octagon and moves closer to title contention, while Waterson suffers her second consecutive loss following a tapout to current champ Rose Namajunas in April.

Up-to-the-minute UFC 218 results include:

• Tecia Torres def. Michelle Waterson via unanimous decision (30-27, 29-28, 29-28)
• Paul Felder def. Charles Oliveira via knockout (strikes) – Round 2, 4:06
• Yancy Medeiros def. Alex Oliveira via TKO (punches) – Round 3, 2:02
• David Teymur def. Drakkar Klose via unanimous decision (30-27, 30-27, 29-28)
• Felice Herrig def. Cortney Casey via split decision (29-28, 28-29, 29-28)
• Amanda Cooper def. Angela Magana via TKO (strikes) – Round 2, 4:34
• Abdul Razak Alhassan def. Sabah Homasi via TKO (punches) – Round 1, 4:21
• Dominick Reyes def. Jeremy Kimball via submission (rear-naked choke) – Round 1, 3:39
• Justin Willis def. Allen Crowder via knockout (punches) – Round 1, 2:33

For complete coverage of UFC 218, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

(MMAjunkie’s Matt Erickson and Mike Bohn contributed to this report on site in Detroit.)