What’s old is new again in the UFC’s featherweight division, and anyone traumatized by the wars of old suffered a major flashback at UFC 314. Alexander Volkanovski didn’t just show up to see what was left in the tank in Miami; he showed up to call us all gossips. Alarmists.
People who must’ve forgot.
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Alexander “The Still Great” Volkanovski put on a masterclass performance in beating Diego Lopes to win back the featherweight title. He looked exactly like the vintage Volkanovski. Exceedingly smart. Lighting quick, with all his trademark sock and pop. And just as fearless as a dictator still deep in his reign.
This news must’ve been disastrous to those who’d hoped for broader possibilities in the wide-open new era. Max Holloway, there’s no sense sticking around 145 pounds if you’re still harboring title hopes. The bane of your existence once again wears the Big Belt Buckle. Yair Rodriguez, though you had dreams of fighting for a title in Guadalajara come fall, Volkanovski has already been there, done that.
Poor Brian Ortega. That title is a million miles away now. A million freaking miles.
It’s an incredible turn of events when you think about it. Usually when they start rolling the credits on your career, it means it’s over. They were doing that on Volkanovski after he lost his featherweight title to Ilia Topuria last February 2024 at UFC 298, getting knocked out brutally in the second round. That was made all the more glaring because less than four months earlier Volkanovski stepped in for an injured Charles Oliveira to rematch Islam Makhachev and got knocked out there, too.
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The first one was an opportunity gone horribly wrong — “ill-fated,” as they like to say in the thinkpieces. The second one was a horrible decision that sent the champion spiraling towards … what? The sad twilight? The glue factory? The place where washed-up champions go to contemplate exactly where everything went wrong?
The tell-tale signs were all there. The knockouts. His advanced age of 36 (and a half). The doubts surrounding him. The emergence of hungry young contenders like Lopes.
Yet 14 months later he showed up to South Beach refreshed and shredded, having used his time away to let things cool off. In that time, he learned how to idle better without a fight on the horizon, a prospect that frightened him during those spiraling moments when he jumped from the frying pan (Makhachev) into the fire (Topuria). He ate better. He drank less.
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And he heard everything.
He heard that former champions have very limited success trying to recapture their titles, especially after the damning, decrepit age of 35. He heard that Lopes wanted this fight more than anything, as he saw it as a coronation. He heard the debates about who the best featherweight champion of all time was, with his name holding a tenuous spot in the conversation. He heard that this was his last shot to stay up. Lose this one, and the waning is real. No amount of delusion can mess with a long pink streak on the Wikipedia page.
Alexander Volkanovski (right) turned back the clock against Diego Lopes at UFC 314. (Megan Briggs/Getty Images)
(Megan Briggs via Getty Images)
No, Volk arrived on the scene like a man there to take back a lost possession. He replaced the bulbs in the dimly lit asterisks that sat over his losses and made them beam just as bright as his five title defenses. You could sense it early in the first round, when he began to find his rhythm, piecing Lopes up with shots and snapping smart reprimands on each advance. He meant business, and it was clear.
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Some people wondered why Lopes wasn’t headhunting like he usually does, why he wasn’t lunging forward trying to test Volk’s chin. It was because he was processing too much information at once. His eyes were like spinning beach balls, the kind of thing we’ve seen before with Jose Aldo, Holloway, Rodriguez and Chad Mendes. The moment had arrived, and he was caught between conserving energy in his first five-round fight, respecting the level changes for the takedown, and eating a jab that he had little to no appetite for.
Classic Volk, the human vortex.
Saturday’s performance was reminiscent of the third Holloway fight, when Max — who’d already spent 50 minutes in the Octagon trying to solve Australia’s great puzzle — felt like he was in the eddy of a recurring nightmare. Everything he tried in that fight, Volk predicted and countered and punished. Volk nearly anticipated his every move, and adapted to the things he didn’t in real time. He switched stances, levels and perceptions in turning the trilogy into a laugher. At times Volk had Max seeing double.
Similar to Lopes, who at least had his moments. He landed a big shot in the second round that dropped Volkanovski and made the round a little tougher to score. In the fourth, an uppercut landed flush and cut him open, temporarily causing Volkanovski to lose sight in his left eye. Between the fourth and fifth he recovered, and put the exclamation point on what will go down as a virtuoso performance.
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Will it be Movsar Evloev next? Will he work his way back to Topuria at some point? How far is Arnold Allen, or Lerone Murphy, or Jean Silva from challenging Volkanovski? It’s crazy that we’ll be asking questions like that again.
“Adversity is a privilege,” Volk said in the post-fight interview with Joe Rogan.
It is, and guess what else is? Watching Alexander Volkanovski prove all of us who doubted him wrong.
