In the 8th bout of the night we have a featherweight showdown between MMA veteran Michael Lawrence and home town favorite Francis Marshall. Coming into the fight, Marshall was 4-0, and one of the promotions top prospects.
Marshall lived up to the hype early on, dropping Marshall in the opening ten seconds, and parlaying that into a dominant top position. After the knockdown, Marshall used his top position, as well as the clinch to land some massive ground and pound, and some huge knees in the clinch. Marshall dominated the round, and finished it on Lawrence’s back landing punches.
Both men came out swinging for the fences to start the second, but after about twenty seconds of that Marshall landed a power double and pinned Lawrence up against the cage. After some taking some brilliant advice from his corner, Francis pinned Lawrence’s arm down, and started HAMMERING him against the cage. It was a claustrophobic beating, similar to those of Khabib, but Lawerence was able to impressively survive, and live to see the third round.
As soon as the third round started, Marshall caught ahold of a Lazy Lawrence knee, and once again took him down against the cage. This time, however, Marshall took his back, and nearly finished a rear naked choke, but Lawrence again escaped, just to get taken right back down. Then Marshall again took his back again, and was able to finally finish a rear naked choke with about 90 seconds left in the round.
It was complete and utter dominance from Marshall tonight, as he proved why he’s one of the regions top prospects at 145lbs. He’ll move to 5-0 with this win, and is certainly gonna earn the attention of some top tier organizations.
