A bantamweight fight between Umar Nurmagomedov and Raoni Barcelos has been booked for UFC Fight Night 217 on January 14th in Las Vegas>
The 26-year-old Nurmagomedov comes from an impressive family lineage, with his cousin being legendary lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov, while he’s also the older brother of Bellator’s newly crowned lightweight champion Usman Nurmagomedov.
And Umar is a major force in his own right, carrying an undefeated 15-0 career record that includes three victories in the UFC so far.
His time in the Octagon began with a second round submission stoppage of Sergey Morozov early last year, while this year he submitted Brian Kelleher and followed that up with a unanimous decision victory over Nate Maness to take the No.12 spot in the 135lb rankings.
His next opponent, the 35-year-old Barcelos is currently unranked, but he too is a well regarded fighter who is a decorated BJJ player and holds a 17-3 career record, including a 6-2 run in the UFC.
Barcelos began his time in the promotion with five wins in a row, but then suffered back-to-back decision losses against Timur Valiev and Victory Henry. However, he has since picked up a unanimous decision win over Trevin Jones to get back on track.
Nurmagomedov vs. Barcelos joins a UFC Fight Night 217 card which will be the promotion’s first show of 2023 and is headlined by middleweight action as Kelvin Gastelum fights Nassourdine Imavov, while Shavkat Rakhmonov goes up against Geoff Neal and Ketlen Vieira takes on Raquel Pennington.
