Silverbacks, Tiger Sharks Win in IFL
Josh Gross Apr 8, 2007
MOLINE, Ill., April 7 -- If the Quad Cities Silverbacks repeat as
International Fight League champions, they'll likely look back
fondly to tonight.
In front of a partisan crowd, the defending champs out-dueled the Reno Lions to a 4-1 victory, vaulting them into a fifth place tie with the Seattle Tiger Sharks, who also won 4-1 tonight at the Mark of the Quad Cities.
Wins by Rory Markham
(Pictures), Ryan McGivern (Pictures) and Ben Rothwell (Pictures) moved the Silverbacks to .500 at
the midway point of the IFL season, leaving the door open for a
return to the playoffs which begin in August.
"I asked them to train extremely hard, and pushed them to the limit," said Silverbacks head coach Pat Miletich (Pictures). "They responded and did everything I asked them to do. I think they came in to tonight with a lot of confidence and they'll do so in Chicago also. I know that we want another ring."
Healy connected early in the first round with a jab-straight combination that put Markham on the canvas. The rest of the period belonged to the Lions welterweight, who worked hard to put Markham away.
"It's funny, right before I went into the ring Pat told me to ‘fight a smart fight. Go out there with your hands up and your chin down,'" recalled Markham. "And about five seconds later I was on my ass."
But the hard-punching welterweight hung in there, dealt with getting hit and finally unloaded power punches, which prompted Healy to go for a takedown. Healy mounted and briefly took back-control, however Markham survived and, his faced covered in crimson, continued to rally.
"He's a guy who's dangerous everywhere," Healy said about Markham. "On the feet he can end a fight in one moment, and that's a dangerous fighter to fight. He's got a great chin. He can take everything you hit him with."
Before the final period, Miletich advised Markham to circle right.
"That opened a completely different set of angles for me," said Markham, who scored the victory at 1:47 of the third. "I saw the right hand and think I coupled it with a couple left hooks. And, in the end, it's that power. I had enough in the tank in order to ask for that in the third round."
McGivern put Quad Cities up 2-0 with a workmanlike unanimous decision against middleweight Daniel Molina. However veteran light heavyweight Vernon White momentarily put the victory on hold with a submission over Sam Hoger (Pictures), who stepped in for injured Silverback Mike Ciesnolevicz (Pictures).
With a badly injured back, White survived a tight guillotine attempt before taking a choke of his own, forcing the tap at 3:25 of round two. After aggravating the injury following a Hoger bodylock takedown, White said he had to finish the fight.
"If he grabbed me again it would be over," White said.
"Vernon's a crafty veteran, and he managed to get out of it," Hoger said of the failed guillotine. "I was shocked because it was sunk deep. He fought a good fight, he got the win."
As he's done for the Silverbacks (1-1) since they began competing in the spring of 2006, Ben Rothwell (Pictures) won his heavyweight bout. However Roy Nelson (Pictures) didn't make it easy on the brawler from Wisconsin.
Deducted a point for grabbing the ropes in the opening round, Rothwell stalked and scored against his hefty challenger. They traded shots for 12 minutes, after which judges at ringside awarded the win unanimously to Rothwell.
"I think the fans won that fight for Ben," said Lions head coach Ken Shamrock (Pictures). "Because anytime Ben landed one punch they went nuts and when Nelson landed four punches it was quiet. So sometimes the judges forget to write down on paper exactly what was done in the round. And they get in that third round and they forget things that are going on."
"That's definitely something that could play into a judge's mind and how they're seeing a fight," Miletich responded. "Hopefully it doesn't if the judge is doing his job. But as we lost in Houston we left it up to the judges. That was our fault for losing that because we left it up to judges. So really it's up to fighters to finish their opponent so they don't have to worry about things like that."
"With a point deduction, for the life of me, I can't see a clean sweep," said Shamrock. "Two judges awarded all three rounds to Ben. I was just amazed."
The Rothwell victory (29-27 twice for "Big" Ben and the same score for Nelson once) made Bart Palaszewski (Pictures)'s split decision over John Gunderson (Pictures) less painful - and controversial - for the Lions.
Working on a badly injured ankle, "Bartimus" didn't have the explosiveness that's shone through in his six previous IFL clashes. "I could barely walk," said Palaszewski. "The idiot that I am I came out and kicked him right in the leg with my bad ankle. That pretty much finished my leg off. My conditioning was crappy. I couldn't move the way I wanted to."
Gunderson appeared to take advantage by winning two of the fight's three rounds. "I thought I clearly won the first round," said the Lions lightweight, whose team fell to 1-1. "The second round, I knew that he won. When I stood up in the second round I knew that he won that round. So I knew Ken and the coaches told me ‘you gotta win this round' and that's what I did."
Not according to two of the three judges at ringside.
"How they score the fight, how they see the fight, that's not what I do," Shamrock said when asked about the close decisions. "I have to train my guys. I've got to get them ready to mentally and physically prepared to do battle. They did their job tonight."
The defending champs return to the ring one final time this season on May 19, when they travel to Chicago to face the Igor Zinoviev-led Red Bears, who fell short tonight against Seattle.
Wins by Shad Lierley (Pictures), Bristol Marunde (Pictures) and Allan Goes (Pictures) put Seattle (1-1) over the top, while Reese Andy (Pictures) netted the Tiger Sharks an all-important win that could be the difference if the playoff race comes down to at tie-breaker.
Goes has experienced a personal renaissance under the tutelage of Seattle head coach Maurice Smith (Pictures). The Brazilian veteran continued his successful IFL run Saturday, stopping Homer Moore (Pictures) to clinch a Seattle victory.
Moore set up an overhand right in the opening seconds, but missed his best chance of the fight. Goes, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu expert, looked content to work on his striking, but outside of a nice right hand lead he didn't do much.
Notorious for his terrible cardio, Moore was surprisingly fresh as the opening frame came to a close. He was active throughout and a good low click dropped the Brazilian to the floor.
The light heavyweights slugged it out in the clinch to open round two before the fight hit the floor for the first time. Goes meddled with the idea of submitting Moore, before the fight returned to the feet.
Visibly tired, Moore simply stood in front of Goes, who offered a low kick to his stationary target. Moore checked the kick, which elicited a grimace across his face and saw him slowly drop to the blue canvas.
"I felt my shin almost going through his knee," Goes said. "I knew he felt it the way he checked it, because I kicked him unbelievably hard."
Goes followed and unloaded until referee James Clingerman put a halt to the contest at 2:56 of the second round, sealing a Tiger Shark victory.
Bristol Marunde (Pictures) put Seattle up 2-1 when he capitalized on the fact that John Kading held his head like he was trying to balance a plate. After popping Kading with a left hand to the chin, Marunde followed with several downward punches later referee the contest was called at 1:35 of the first.
Mark Miller got the Red Bears (0-2) on the board with a rather surprising unanimous decision verdict over Brad Blackburn (Pictures).
While Miller attempted and connected with little else but power punches during the 12-minute fight, it seemed pretty clear that Blackburn had taken the first and second periods.
Blackburn, 2-2 in IFL competition, dropped Miller in the first with an overhand right and in the middle round connected with a right straight that thudded off Miller's face. Taking advantage of the heavy strike, Blackburn put Miller on his back and pounded away until the bell.
Miller's best round of the fight was the third, when he unloaded with power punches, several of which hurt Blackburn. Miller put his welterweight foe down and dropped consecutive right hands that inspired the Quad Cities crowd. This is where the fight remained until the final bell.
"I didn't really look at that fight at how I can lose, especially a unanimous decision," said Blackburn, who like every virtually everyone involved with tonight's card declined to speak negatively about the judging.
Lierley scored a tight split decision win over Mike Correy to jumpstart Seattle. It was a quality lightweight fight, one replete with every aspect of MMA, save submissions.
Correy used a stiff jab throughout the bout, but particularly in the first against a tentative Lierley. At the end of one, Lierley wore a large mouse under his right eye, but that didn't prevent him from going forward in the second and making a scrap out of it.
Midway through the round, Lierley began to walk through Correy's strikes and soon the Chicago Red Bear joined his foe in wearing the effects of the fight on his face.
The best punch of the clash came in the third, when Correy planted a left hook on Lierley's jaw that gave the Tiger Shark pause. There was no doubt that Lierley was pushing his body to the limits. For much of the final period he took oxygen in through his mouth. Yet he mustered enough of an effort to not only stand up to Correy's attacks but to get the nod from two of the three ringside judges.
With the team result settled, heavyweight Reese Andy (Pictures) took care of business against Chicago's Adam Maciejewski for a second-round submission win, making the final tally 4-1.
"Now we work from this point," said the Tiger Shark's head coach. "We had a good outing. We could have had five [wins], but we got four. We're not in an impossible situation. We need to win three, of course. Four would be preferable."
"We win three it's gonna be kinda close," Smith said about his team's clash on June 1 against Los Angeles, which sits atop the IFL standings. "We win five and we're in for the semifinals."
Curran wins with ease
Originally slated for the May card in Chicago, the IFL moved up Jeff Curran (Pictures)'s superfight in response to the California State Athletic Commission nixing a proposed bout between Mo Smith and Southern California Condors head coach Marco Ruas (Pictures) last month.
Curran, who should fight at 145 pounds but tonight stepped into the ring as a lightweight, easily handled Indiana's Kevin English (Pictures), securing a submission win early in the second round.
Alternate fights
Tristan Wit (Pictures) from the Tiger Sharks forced Chicago lightweight Pavel Zurochka to quit on his stool between the second and third rounds.
With the Reno Lions in his corner, middleweight Rick Reeves choked Luke Johnson of the Silverbacks at 3:30 of the opening period.
In front of a partisan crowd, the defending champs out-dueled the Reno Lions to a 4-1 victory, vaulting them into a fifth place tie with the Seattle Tiger Sharks, who also won 4-1 tonight at the Mark of the Quad Cities.
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"I asked them to train extremely hard, and pushed them to the limit," said Silverbacks head coach Pat Miletich (Pictures). "They responded and did everything I asked them to do. I think they came in to tonight with a lot of confidence and they'll do so in Chicago also. I know that we want another ring."
A pattern has been established with Markham, the Silverback's
welterweight, who kicked off his team's showdown with Reno. He gets
hit - a lot - and fires back - hard. That equation led to the Quad
Cities crowd exploding in approval after he unleashed a hellish
right straight on the Lions Pat
Healy (Pictures) midway through the third
period.
Healy connected early in the first round with a jab-straight combination that put Markham on the canvas. The rest of the period belonged to the Lions welterweight, who worked hard to put Markham away.
"It's funny, right before I went into the ring Pat told me to ‘fight a smart fight. Go out there with your hands up and your chin down,'" recalled Markham. "And about five seconds later I was on my ass."
But the hard-punching welterweight hung in there, dealt with getting hit and finally unloaded power punches, which prompted Healy to go for a takedown. Healy mounted and briefly took back-control, however Markham survived and, his faced covered in crimson, continued to rally.
"He's a guy who's dangerous everywhere," Healy said about Markham. "On the feet he can end a fight in one moment, and that's a dangerous fighter to fight. He's got a great chin. He can take everything you hit him with."
Before the final period, Miletich advised Markham to circle right.
"That opened a completely different set of angles for me," said Markham, who scored the victory at 1:47 of the third. "I saw the right hand and think I coupled it with a couple left hooks. And, in the end, it's that power. I had enough in the tank in order to ask for that in the third round."
McGivern put Quad Cities up 2-0 with a workmanlike unanimous decision against middleweight Daniel Molina. However veteran light heavyweight Vernon White momentarily put the victory on hold with a submission over Sam Hoger (Pictures), who stepped in for injured Silverback Mike Ciesnolevicz (Pictures).
With a badly injured back, White survived a tight guillotine attempt before taking a choke of his own, forcing the tap at 3:25 of round two. After aggravating the injury following a Hoger bodylock takedown, White said he had to finish the fight.
"If he grabbed me again it would be over," White said.
"Vernon's a crafty veteran, and he managed to get out of it," Hoger said of the failed guillotine. "I was shocked because it was sunk deep. He fought a good fight, he got the win."
As he's done for the Silverbacks (1-1) since they began competing in the spring of 2006, Ben Rothwell (Pictures) won his heavyweight bout. However Roy Nelson (Pictures) didn't make it easy on the brawler from Wisconsin.
Deducted a point for grabbing the ropes in the opening round, Rothwell stalked and scored against his hefty challenger. They traded shots for 12 minutes, after which judges at ringside awarded the win unanimously to Rothwell.
"I think the fans won that fight for Ben," said Lions head coach Ken Shamrock (Pictures). "Because anytime Ben landed one punch they went nuts and when Nelson landed four punches it was quiet. So sometimes the judges forget to write down on paper exactly what was done in the round. And they get in that third round and they forget things that are going on."
"That's definitely something that could play into a judge's mind and how they're seeing a fight," Miletich responded. "Hopefully it doesn't if the judge is doing his job. But as we lost in Houston we left it up to the judges. That was our fault for losing that because we left it up to judges. So really it's up to fighters to finish their opponent so they don't have to worry about things like that."
"With a point deduction, for the life of me, I can't see a clean sweep," said Shamrock. "Two judges awarded all three rounds to Ben. I was just amazed."
The Rothwell victory (29-27 twice for "Big" Ben and the same score for Nelson once) made Bart Palaszewski (Pictures)'s split decision over John Gunderson (Pictures) less painful - and controversial - for the Lions.
Working on a badly injured ankle, "Bartimus" didn't have the explosiveness that's shone through in his six previous IFL clashes. "I could barely walk," said Palaszewski. "The idiot that I am I came out and kicked him right in the leg with my bad ankle. That pretty much finished my leg off. My conditioning was crappy. I couldn't move the way I wanted to."
Gunderson appeared to take advantage by winning two of the fight's three rounds. "I thought I clearly won the first round," said the Lions lightweight, whose team fell to 1-1. "The second round, I knew that he won. When I stood up in the second round I knew that he won that round. So I knew Ken and the coaches told me ‘you gotta win this round' and that's what I did."
Not according to two of the three judges at ringside.
"How they score the fight, how they see the fight, that's not what I do," Shamrock said when asked about the close decisions. "I have to train my guys. I've got to get them ready to mentally and physically prepared to do battle. They did their job tonight."
The defending champs return to the ring one final time this season on May 19, when they travel to Chicago to face the Igor Zinoviev-led Red Bears, who fell short tonight against Seattle.
Wins by Shad Lierley (Pictures), Bristol Marunde (Pictures) and Allan Goes (Pictures) put Seattle (1-1) over the top, while Reese Andy (Pictures) netted the Tiger Sharks an all-important win that could be the difference if the playoff race comes down to at tie-breaker.
Goes has experienced a personal renaissance under the tutelage of Seattle head coach Maurice Smith (Pictures). The Brazilian veteran continued his successful IFL run Saturday, stopping Homer Moore (Pictures) to clinch a Seattle victory.
Moore set up an overhand right in the opening seconds, but missed his best chance of the fight. Goes, a Brazilian jiu-jitsu expert, looked content to work on his striking, but outside of a nice right hand lead he didn't do much.
Notorious for his terrible cardio, Moore was surprisingly fresh as the opening frame came to a close. He was active throughout and a good low click dropped the Brazilian to the floor.
The light heavyweights slugged it out in the clinch to open round two before the fight hit the floor for the first time. Goes meddled with the idea of submitting Moore, before the fight returned to the feet.
Visibly tired, Moore simply stood in front of Goes, who offered a low kick to his stationary target. Moore checked the kick, which elicited a grimace across his face and saw him slowly drop to the blue canvas.
"I felt my shin almost going through his knee," Goes said. "I knew he felt it the way he checked it, because I kicked him unbelievably hard."
Goes followed and unloaded until referee James Clingerman put a halt to the contest at 2:56 of the second round, sealing a Tiger Shark victory.
Bristol Marunde (Pictures) put Seattle up 2-1 when he capitalized on the fact that John Kading held his head like he was trying to balance a plate. After popping Kading with a left hand to the chin, Marunde followed with several downward punches later referee the contest was called at 1:35 of the first.
Mark Miller got the Red Bears (0-2) on the board with a rather surprising unanimous decision verdict over Brad Blackburn (Pictures).
While Miller attempted and connected with little else but power punches during the 12-minute fight, it seemed pretty clear that Blackburn had taken the first and second periods.
Blackburn, 2-2 in IFL competition, dropped Miller in the first with an overhand right and in the middle round connected with a right straight that thudded off Miller's face. Taking advantage of the heavy strike, Blackburn put Miller on his back and pounded away until the bell.
Miller's best round of the fight was the third, when he unloaded with power punches, several of which hurt Blackburn. Miller put his welterweight foe down and dropped consecutive right hands that inspired the Quad Cities crowd. This is where the fight remained until the final bell.
"I didn't really look at that fight at how I can lose, especially a unanimous decision," said Blackburn, who like every virtually everyone involved with tonight's card declined to speak negatively about the judging.
Lierley scored a tight split decision win over Mike Correy to jumpstart Seattle. It was a quality lightweight fight, one replete with every aspect of MMA, save submissions.
Correy used a stiff jab throughout the bout, but particularly in the first against a tentative Lierley. At the end of one, Lierley wore a large mouse under his right eye, but that didn't prevent him from going forward in the second and making a scrap out of it.
Midway through the round, Lierley began to walk through Correy's strikes and soon the Chicago Red Bear joined his foe in wearing the effects of the fight on his face.
The best punch of the clash came in the third, when Correy planted a left hook on Lierley's jaw that gave the Tiger Shark pause. There was no doubt that Lierley was pushing his body to the limits. For much of the final period he took oxygen in through his mouth. Yet he mustered enough of an effort to not only stand up to Correy's attacks but to get the nod from two of the three ringside judges.
With the team result settled, heavyweight Reese Andy (Pictures) took care of business against Chicago's Adam Maciejewski for a second-round submission win, making the final tally 4-1.
"Now we work from this point," said the Tiger Shark's head coach. "We had a good outing. We could have had five [wins], but we got four. We're not in an impossible situation. We need to win three, of course. Four would be preferable."
"We win three it's gonna be kinda close," Smith said about his team's clash on June 1 against Los Angeles, which sits atop the IFL standings. "We win five and we're in for the semifinals."
Curran wins with ease
Originally slated for the May card in Chicago, the IFL moved up Jeff Curran (Pictures)'s superfight in response to the California State Athletic Commission nixing a proposed bout between Mo Smith and Southern California Condors head coach Marco Ruas (Pictures) last month.
Curran, who should fight at 145 pounds but tonight stepped into the ring as a lightweight, easily handled Indiana's Kevin English (Pictures), securing a submission win early in the second round.
Alternate fights
Tristan Wit (Pictures) from the Tiger Sharks forced Chicago lightweight Pavel Zurochka to quit on his stool between the second and third rounds.
With the Reno Lions in his corner, middleweight Rick Reeves choked Luke Johnson of the Silverbacks at 3:30 of the opening period.
