Diego Lopes fell short in his second chance at featherweight gold Saturday at UFC 325 when he lost to Alexander Volkanovski again.
Many believed the opportunity for Lopes (27-8 MMA, 6-3 UFC) was unjust in a division ripe with fresh challengers for Volkanovski (28-4 MMA, 15-3 UFC). He just lost the initial meeting at UFC 314 in April, and only recorded one win in between.
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Lopes failed to make any radical adjustments in the rematch, which was perhaps the most disappointing part of his unanimous decision defeat at Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney. Now he finds himself cornered in the weight class, with no path or demand for a third crack at gold as long as Volkanovski is running the weight class.
There wasn’t much demand for this rematch in reality, either. But the selling point was that Lopes was the most entertaining option for the second headliner of the UFC on Paramount era, over the likes of Movsar Evloev, Lerone Murphy or Aljamain Sterling.
He did produce the Fight of the Night again with Volkanovski, but it lacked a layer of intrigue that others arguably would’ve brought.
Nevertheless, this is the situation that played out and now Lopes, 31, ends up being the biggest loser in terms of the title queue. The good thing, though, is that there’s a very clear matchup to make with someone in the top five, and that’s Yair Rodriguez (20-5 MMA, 11-4 UFC).
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This was the fight everyone wanted to see at Noche UFC in September when Lopes beat Jean Silva to secure his rematch against Volkanovski, but it didn’t happen. These two don’t like each other and had a public spat at a press conference in 2025, and now it’s time to put them in the octagon together to settle it.
This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: UFC 325 matchmaker: Who’s next for Diego Lopes after loss?
