HONOLULU — Liz Carmouche felt disrespected on weigh-in day, so she felt compelled to return the favor on DeAnna Bennett on fight night.
Bennett failed to make weight for the women’s flyweight championship fight at Bellator 294 at the Blaisdell Arena. Instead of canceling the fight, the defending champ Carmouche decided to go ahead with it with the understanding her opponent would have a weight advantage and that if Bennett won Friday in front of a crowd comprised of military members and first responders, the flyweight title would be vacated, not transferred.
Afterward, Carmouche (19-7), a former U.S. Marine, did not mince words about Bennett (13-8-1), who also missed weight in their previous fight in September 2020. That similarly ended in a Carmouche submission.
“I wanted to finish her off and make a huge statement, and shut her up and get her out of this sport, so she can take her crude remarks and her lack of professionalism somewhere else,” Carmouche said.
After the challenger appeared to have the upper hand through three rounds by taking Carmouche down in each – all three judges had it scored 30-27 to that point – the champion showed resolve and submitted Bennett via arm triangle choke 4:29 into Round 4.
She dismissed the fact that Bennett got on top of her against the sides of the ring multiple times, saying it was a natural advantage for someone with more weight and who hadn’t done a weight cut.
It was Carmouche’s sixth straight win and second title defense since taking the belt from Juliana Velasquez at the Blaisdell in April 2022. She said she could feel Bennett’s energy waning after Carmouche narrowly missed submissions on a 10-finger guillotine and a crucifix earlier in the round.
“Her claim to fame in this sport is missing weight, not making weight. That shouldn’t be it,” Carmouche said. “You’re a professional MMA fighter. You think you’re going to be the champion by missing weight? … You don’t deserve to have the belt.
“Now, if she put on that performance having made weight, I would be saying something different. I would give her props for what she did. But the reality is she cheated yet again by missing weight, like I said she would before this fight.”
Whether or not an intentional slight by Bellator after she missed weight, Bennett’s pre-fight introduction lacked much of the fanfare of the champion’s.
The two awkwardly touched gloves at the start of the fight. After it was over, Bennett leaned in and spoke to Carmouche. Carmouche said it was congratulatory and respectful, but she didn’t want to hear it after what she felt was a lack of seriousness from Bennett at Thursday’s weigh-in. Bennett came in at 126.2 pounds; Carmouche said Bennett didn’t appear to have seriously tried to make a weight cut to get to 125.
“To me if you miss weight a second time, and you laugh it off, you don’t respect your opponent, you don’t care for the work they’re putting in,” Carmouche said.
As is Bellator’s custom, the losing fighter was not invited to the post-fight interview podium.
Carmouche will be in house Saturday night for Bellator 295, when several of Hawaii’s homegrown fighters will compete, headlined by Ilima-Lei Macfarlane’s flyweight bout against Kana Watanabe in the main card televised live on Showtime.
The champ smiled when she was asked whether she expected to be called out after that fight, whether it was Bellator’s No. 2-ranked flyweight Watanabe (11-1) or No. 3 Macfarlane (12-2), her former training partner.
“While I’m a big fan of Kana and I’m a big fan of Ilima, at the end of the day, I’m a bigger fan of Ilima and I want to see her succeed,” Carmouche said. “I perfectly expect at the end of the fight to get called into the cage and asked to be fighting against them.”
Macfarlane, the Punahou alumna and former flyweight champ, has said a title fight against her good friend Carmouche would be a “fairytale” way to end her career.
But first, she must get past Watanabe. She’ll have the backing of the home crowd — Bellator 295 was on sale to the general public — as she did in past Bellator events in the islands. This time last year, Macfarlane lost to Justine Kish by unanimous decision at the Blaisdell. She later beat Bruna Ellen at Bellator 284 in August.
Other local fighters scheduled to fight Saturday include Sumiko Inaba, Yancy Medeiros and Kai Kamaka III.
The main event is Patchy Mix and Raufeon Stotts competing in the Bellator Bantamweight World Grand Prix final with a $1 million prize on the line.
Two fights of Bellator 295 were canceled because a fighter missed weight: Ray Borg vs. Kyoji Horiguchi and Keoni Diggs vs. Weber Almedia. Subsequently, Medeiros’ fight against Charlie Leary was given a bump to the main card from the undercard.
The other main card results of Bellator 294:
>> Tim Johnson (16-9) def. Said Sowma (8-5), decision, heavyweight co-main event
>> Sara McMann (14-6) def. Arlene Blencowe (15-10), decision, featherweight
>> Danny Sabatello (14-2) def. Marcos Breno (15-3), submission, bantamweight
>> Levan Chokheli (12-2) def. Michael Lombardo (13-4), decision, welterweight
Brian McInnis covers the state's sports scene for Spectrum News Hawaii. He can be reached at brian.mcinnis@charter.com.