MMA: Two tournament finals top Lewiston Bellator card

LEWISTON — Two tournament championship matches and two heavyweight bouts will headline Bellator’s Maine debut card scheduled for Thursday, March 21, at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.

The Newport Beach, Calif.,-based Bellator, the nation’s second-largest MMA organization, announced this week a 12-bout slate that also will feature several of the state’s top fighters.

The event will be broadcast live starting at 10 p.m. on Spike TV as well as in Spanish language on mun2. The preliminary card will be streamed live and free on Spike.com starting at 7:30 p.m.

The evening’s main event will match 20-year-old Marcin Held of Tychy, Poland, against Dave “The Fugitive” Jansen of Corbett, Ore., in Bellator’s lightweight tournament final, with the winner receiving $100,000 and a guaranteed title berth.

Held (15-2) is considered one of the sport’s top submission specialists, while Jansen is 18-2 and riding a five-match winning streak.

“Marcin has the total package when it comes to submissions,” said Jansen in a press release, “so I know what I need to focus on to win this fight and get a shot at the Bellator title.”

Bellator’s welterweight tournament final will pit Douglas “The Phenom” Lima (24-5) of Atlanta, Ga., against Ben “Killa B” Saunders (16-5) of Orlando, Fla. Each advanced to the final with first-round knockout victories Thursday night at West Valley City, Utah.

Two heavyweight bouts round out the main card.

Brett “Da Grim” Rogers (12-5) of Minneapolis, Minn., will take on Eric “The American Soldier” Prindle (9-3) of Prescott, Ariz. Rogers is making a comeback bid after suffering a broken arm during his last fight against eventual Bellator heavyweight champion Alexander Volkov.

Veteran Travis “Diesel” Wiuff of Rochester, Minn., will bring a prolific 68-15 record into his bout against Ryan Martinez (8-2) of Greely, Colo.

Heading up the preliminary card will be a welterweight bout between Bangor’s Marcus “The Irish Hand Grenade” Davis and Waachiim Spirit Wolf of San Diego.

Davis (21-9) will be making his Bellator debut in the first fight of a three-fight contract he signed with the organization earlier this year, while Spirit Wolf (9-11) will be looking to halt a four-fight losing streak.

Several fighters up from the Maine-based New England Fights promotion will be making their Bellator debuts on the preliminary card, including Bangor’s Jon Lemke, Brewer’s “The” Ryan Sanders, Auburn’s Jesse Erickson, Lewiston’s Brent “Frosty” Dillingham, Topsham’s John “First Class” Raio and reigning NEF Maine middleweight champion Jesse Peterson of Rumford.

Sanders (4-3) will take on London-based welterweight Michael “Venom” Page, who is 3-0 in his professional MMA career since making the transition from kickboxing, a discipline in which he is a 10-time world champion. That bout originally was expected to be part of the main card, but with the two tournament finals and two heavyweight fights on the schedule it was shifted to the preliminary card.

Erickson, 4-2 as an amateur, will make his pro debut against Lemke (1-0) in a lightweight bout, while Dillingham also will have his first pro fight against 4-0 Mike “Crazy” Mucitelli of Syracuse, N.Y.

Raio, 0-2 in the pro ranks, will face Vince Murdock (1-0) of Detroit, Mich., in a featherweight bout, while Peterson (7-2) will battle veteran middleweight Dave Vitkay (11-12) of Atlanta, Ga.

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