Jon Jones vs. Glover Teixeira set to headline UFC 171 in
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before but the UFC has officially announced that the long-awaited fight between UFC Light Heavyweight champion Jon Jones and Glover Teixeira will take place in early 2014.
Originally, both men were scheduled to meet on Super Bowl weekend at UFC 169 in New Jersey before scheduling conflicts forced the company to move the fight to UFC 170 in Las Vegas. But the fight was once again rescheduled due to lingering injuries to Jones.
Jones is, of course, coming off a unanimous decision victory over Alexander Gustafsson at UFC 165, a fight that left both men bruised and bloodied after 25 minutes of back-and-forth action.
Initially, Jones was open to the idea of granting Gustafsson an immediate rematch, but upon reviewing the fight and determining it was not as close as initially thought, he decided it was time to move on to a new opponent.
Teixeira, currently the No. 2 ranked light heavyweight according to the official UFC fighter rankings, is coming off a tough first-round TKO victory over The Power MMA Show’s Ryan Bader at UFC Fight Night 28. That victory not only pushed his winning streak to five straight wins inside the octagon, but to 18 straight overall dating back to 2006.
UFC 171 is scheduled to take place March 15, 2014 in the American Airlines Center in Dallas. No other fights have made official for the card.