Jon Jones Defeats Rashad Evans at UFC 145 to Retain the Light Heavyweight Championship

By - Kris Fletcher

Needless to say, last night's long awaited main event for the light heavyweight title at UFC 145 in Atlanta failed to live up to the hype.

Photo by: Esther Lin

After an intense buildup following a falling out between the former training partners, the rivals produced a headliner that lacked the fireworks many had predicted. Instead, Jones shut down Evans with a well balanced attack, as Evans struggled throughout the five round contest to land power strikes and takedowns.

Throughout the fight, the champ remained light on his feet, countered well, and mixed up his strikes to keep Evans guessing. In the end, it carried Jones to a lopsided unanimous decision victory by the scores of 49-46, 49-46 and 50-45.

"It's definitely my most satisfying victory," Jones said afterwards. "With who I beat, it was very important to me. I was a little surprised I didn't put him away. My goal was to knock him out, so hat's off to Rashad."

Evans admitted Jones confused him.

"He was pretty crafty and tricky and stuff like that," Evans said. "He was creative and kept me on my toes. I've got to give it up to him. He had those sneaky elbows that kept getting in there, and I just basically had the wrong game plan for the fight."

With the performance, Jones (16-1 MMA, 10-1 UFC) picked up his seventh straight win and third consecutive title defense. Meanwhile, Evans (17-2-1 MMA, 12-2-1 UFC) suffered just the second loss of his professional career following a four fight winning streak which earned him the right to try and reclaim the belt he lost to Lyoto Machida back in 2009.