The tables turned. At least that’s how it is Diego Lopes sees his ongoing rivalry with fellow UFC contender Movsar Evloev.
Lopes, who lost to Evloev in his UFC debut in 2023, has long called for a rematch with the Russian fighter. However, there was little attention or attention to Evloev’s appeal. Now, a year later, Lopes is in a very different position and has been called out by Evloev – something he doesn’t want to consider for now.
“I think at this point, what can I say, I think we basically have a top-five fight guaranteed, so right now fighting him is not in my plans,” Lopes told MMA Junkie in Spanish. “If he is the last option, OK, then we accept it – no problem. But from what we discussed with my team and the UFC, we are facing a completely different fight.”
Lopes is coming off a unanimous decision victory over Dan Ige, in a fight he accepted four hours in advance, in one of the wildest moments in modern UFC history. That win capped a 4-0 run that transformed Lopes into a 145-pound contender and one of the promotion’s most beloved fighters.
Lopes (25-6 MMA, 4-1 UFC) finds it funny how the dynamic with Evloev (18-0 MMA, 8-0 UFC) has changed so drastically.
“Now he’s saying he wants to give me the rematch at the Sphere and everything. Now he wants it,” said Lopes. “It took him three months to respond to me when I asked him to fight exactly on that International Fight Week card, this last event.
“So now that he knows that we are in a good position, he knows that a lot of good things have happened to me, now he wants to take advantage of this moment to call me and say that he will give me the rematch. We have completely different plans and there is no rematch with him. I think with everything we’ve done, I deserve something bigger than a rematch with Movsar.”
That doesn’t mean Lopes won’t fight Evloev eventually. Lopes is aiming to return to Noche UFC at the Sphere in Las Vegas on September 14 against Brian Ortega or Alexander Volkanovski for now, but isn’t sure what the future will bring beyond that.
“We will definitely meet again in the future, but in the meantime he must stay hidden in the mountains as he has done for the last three months,” said Lopes.
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