Bellator 71 Recap and Results: Brett Rogers is victorious in debut

This Friday night Bellator 71 took place at The Mountaineer Casino, Resort and Racetrack in Chester, West Virginia. Travis Wiuff, Attila Vegh, Emanuel Newton, and Tim Carpenter won their quarterfinal fights and will now move up to the semifinals. Strikeforce veteran Brett "the Grim" Rogers made his Bellator debut with a TKO win over Kevin Asplund in the Heavyweight fight attached to the Main card.

Rogers and Asplund were former friends and training partners. Asplund came in off of a 19-fight win streak. However, that streak was broken tonight as the much larger Rogers totally controlled the fight from start to finish. An uppercut by Rogers opened a nasty cut on Asplund's face and closed his left eye by the end of the second round. Referee Robert Riley consulted a ringside physician who deemed Asplund unfit to continue, awarding the TKO victory to Brett Rogers. This was Rogers' first victory since 2010 and Asplund's first loss since 2002.

After the bout Rogers acknowledged that he knew it would be a hard battle: “I wasn't expecting it to look like this, but it is what it is. He's got a concrete head, I wasn't lying about that, right? It was definitely a tough fight. We trained together in the past, so I knew it was going to be a hard fight. I just want to continue getting better here in Bellator. I just want to get in here and knock these guys out.”

In the Roy Boughton vs. Emanuel Newton bout, it started out looking like it would be one of those jiujitsu clinics that goes to decision. At the start of the second round, the two exchanged a few kicks, but Boughton lunged forward and caught one of Newton's knees with his head. Newton pounced on Boughton, locked him up and got the submission within 49 seconds. An exhausted Newton was elated by winning his Bellator debut: “This is so huge for me. I didn’t have a full training camp, so I wasn’t able to land my slams. Wait until I get a good five week training camp going, then you’ll see my slams.”

Newton may have been training for only three weeks for his debut, but Tim Carpenter took his fight on a few days' notice. After his victory over Beau Tribolet via armbar in the second round Nelson is fired up for the next step in the tournament : "I didn't even expect to be here today. I was a last-minute addition, so that's all that's all that's on my mind right now. I'm ready to go."


Main Card Results:
Light Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal Fight: Travis Wiuff defeated Chris Davis via TKO due to strikes at 4:12 in Round 1
Light Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal Fight: Attila Vegh defeated Zelg Galesic via submission due to rear-naked choke at 1:00 in Round 1
Light Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal Fight: Emanuel Newton defeated Roy Boughton via submission due to rear-naked choke at 0:49 in Round 2
Light Heavyweight Tournament Quarterfinal Fight: Tim Carpenter defeated Beau Tribolet via submission due to armbar at 4:51 in Round 2
Heavyweight Feature Fight: Brett Rogers defeated Kevin Asplund via TKO due to doctor’s stoppage at 5:00 in Round 2

Undercard Results:
Josh Stansbury defeated Dan Spohn via submission due to guillotine choke at 2:30 in Round 1
Jason Butcher defeated Duane Bastress via submission due to triangle choke at 1:03 in Round 1
Neil Johnson defeated Brylan Van Artsdalen via submission due to rear-naked choke at 4:29 in Round 2
Kevin Zalac defeated Chris Goldbaugh via unanimous decision (29-28, 29-28, 29-28)