VanZant-Calderwood strawweight tilt announced as UFC Fight Night 80 headliner

A pivotal strawweight bout between the surging Paige VanZant (6-1) and TUF 20 alum Joanne Calderwood (10-1) will headline the first of three consecutive cards in Las Vegas beginning December 10th through December 12th.

UFC officials announced the bout, which will headline the first United States card in history to be aired exclusively on UFC Fight Pass, earlier today. The TUF 22 season finale, headlined by featherweights Chad Mendes and Frankie Edgar, will take place on the following day while UFC 194 ‘Aldo vs. McGregor’ will headline the weekend on Saturday night.

VanZant extended her win streak to four with a dominant win over Alex Chambers to kick off UFC 191 earlier this month. Calderwood was able to get back to her winning ways with a hard-fought unanimous decision victory over Cortney Casey after a disappointing loss to Maryna Moroz earlier this year in Poland. Her fight against Casey earned both women a fight of the night bonus and shot Calderwood right back into title contention.

Fight Night 80 ‘VanZant vs. Calderwood’ will take place inside of The Chelsea at the Cosmopolitan on Thursday December 10th and will air exclusively on UFC Fight Pass. Here’s a list of the rest of the fights that have also been attached to this card:

• Lightweight Bout: Jim Miller (25-6) vs. Michael Chiesa (12-2)

• Welterweight Bout: Tim Means (24-7-1) vs. John Howard (23-11)

• Middleweight Bout: Elias Theodorou (11-0) vs. Thiago Santos (11-3)

• Middleweight Bout: Kevin Casey (9-3) vs. Antonio Carlos Jr. (5-1)

• Middleweight Bout: Edgar Garcia (14-4) vs. Sheldon Wescott (8-3-1)

• Welterweight Bout: Danny Roberts (11-1) vs. Michael Graves (5-0)

• Welterweight Bout: Andreas Stahl (9-1) vs. Santiago Ponzinibbio (19-3)

• Welterweight Bout: Lyman Good (19-3) vs. Omari Akhmedov (15-2)

• Featherweight Bout: Phillipe Nover (11-5-1) vs. Zubaira Tukhugov (17-3)

• Women’s Strawweight Bout: Kailin Curran (3-2) vs. Emily Kagan (3-2)