Chase Hooper competed on the 11th of May 2024 UFC card against Viacheslav Borshchev. Hooper was able to submit Borshchev in the 2nd round due to a D’Arce Choke. This was Hooper’s third fight in the lightweight division. Previously, Hooper had gone 2-0 since moving up to lightweight and was looking for his third straight victory. Hooper was able to surprise many fans when he was able to drop Borschev. However, Hooper has said he was most likely able to do this due to Borschev being worried about the takedown attempts. Speaking over at BJPENN.com Chase Hooper revealed;
“It is one of those things, a guy who is focused on knocking you out is a lot easier to hit than a guy who is focused on defense. I was just trying to get some respect on the feet, I feel like he was very hesitant on the feet with his striking. He was very weary of my shot, he was ready for me to wrestle off the bat, so assuming that we put the wresting further down in the game plan and we set it up by faking that shot and you know what they say, a broken clock is right twice a day, so that is one of my two times,”
Chase Hooper Believes Borschev Tapped
Chase Hooper was able to get the knockdown against Borschev in the first round. Hooper was able to follow it up with some heavy ground and pound. Hooper has revealed he wasn’t surprised about this as he knows how durable Borschev was;
“We were expecting that going in, I knew he was thought mentally and physically, so I wasn’t super surprised. But, I was surprised Keith did let it go as long as he did. Slava would move when Keith told him to, he was still in the fight just not offensively. I was not super surprised by how durable he was,”
In the second round, Hooper was able to knock down Borschev to land some heavy ground-and-pound once again. However, this time Chase Hooper was able to lock in a submission. It looked like Borschev tapped to end the fight. However, Borschev has protested this claim. Hooper has said watching the fight back he believes Borschev did tap.
“There was one clear tap, I don’t know what that was about. I felt like his grappling was more primitive than I was expecting, I thought I would be up against more on the ground with his scrambles. I had no intention of letting go until the ref told me to stop, so that’s on Keith. My responsibility is to go until the ref tells you to stop and it’s the ref’s responsibility to tell us when to stop. He definitely tapped me, but I can’t say whether it was the famed Brazilian tap or not, trying to maybe get me to let go, but I wasn’t going to do that, I had it locked in. The consensus I’ve seen is whether it was a tap or not, it’s not like it was a close fight,”
What is Next?
Hooper has talked about wanting to spend some time with his wife and be able to welcome his first child. However, once he has spent time with his family and is back fighting he reveals he isn’t sure who he wants next. However, while he doesn’t know what is next he won’t rush being able to fight a ranked fighter;
“That was his first time getting finished… There are like 90 guys in lightweight, it’s one of the toughest divisions in the sport, but it starts to move me up towards the top end of the unranked. I think there are tiers and I moved up to the next tier. It opens up the more known vet guys, potentially two wins away from being in the ranking,” Hooper said.
Featured image credits to Embed from Getty Images