Jack Della Maddalena has vowed to come back stronger after the Aussie star’s comprehensive UFC 322 defeat to Islam Makhachev in New York.
Defending his welterweight title for the first time and stepping in against one of the sport’s modern greats, Della Maddalena was outclassed over five rounds at Madison Square Garden.
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Makhachev imposed his trademark, suffocating wrestling pressure throughout the contest, leaving the Perth fighter with few opportunities to turn the tide.
Della Maddalena broke his silence on Friday morning, posting a brief message to fans on Instagram.
“Thanks to those always supporting,” he wrote.
“Islam is one of the greats and deserved to win. I will learn and move forward.”
The defeat to Makhachev was JDM’s first professional loss since 2016, ending an impressive 18-fight win streak and unseating him from the throne.
Della Maddalena spent more than 18 minutes of the 25-minute fight on his back being dominated by the Russian, and his grimacing throughout the fight led some to wonder if he entered the fight with an injury.
JDM has not addressed the topic yet, but his coach Ben Vickers spoke about the loss on Thursday evening.
“When you commit to having a fight, it doesn’t matter what the f**k is wrong with you, if anything was,” Vickers told Submission Radio.
“I am not going to confirm or deny anything. When we decided to step in the cage, we believed Jack could win that fight.
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“That is all I’m gonna say,” he continued. “There are no excuses here. We didn’t do enough on the day to get the job done.
“I sit here and make no excuses. Jack was ready, and I was confident Jack was going to win.”
Vickers praised Makhachev’s sharp game plan, especially the calf kicks that threw a spanner in the works early and limited Della Maddalena’s movement.
“The game plan was to be further away than that range, probably, and then switching stances a lot,” Vickers said.
“I think when the lead leg gets compromised early, it kind of like hurt the game plan a little bit in terms of stance switching and stuff like that.
“I commend them on their game planning against us. They clearly studied a lot of tape. They had an answer for the head-hands defense with the head kicks and stuff like that.”
Vickers did not have an issue with the strategy Della Maddalena tried, more its execution.
“I don’t think there was an issue with the gameplan, just the execution,” he explained.
“Definitely more movement. We wanted to do more movement. Obviously, we didn’t want to be on the ground for 19 minutes of a 25-minute fight. We wanted to do some damage.”
Vickers also addressed some of the criticism over his cornering during the title fight.
“Technically, Jack knew what he was to do in that fight.
“I don’t really feel it was my role as a coach to in that fight to technically guide Jack. He knew what he was supposed to do. On that day, I feel like Jack needed a kicking in the ass, and I felt like that was what my job as a coach was.”
Next up? According to Vickers, nothing but rest. Once Della Maddalena has reset, they’ll get back to the gym and figure out the path forward.
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“Jack’s not even home yet, so I haven’t had a proper chance to sit down with him and talk to him,” he said.
“You know, straight after the fight, it’s all a bit raw. It’s not the right time to do it. But we’ll have the debrief. We’ll have the hard conversations, we’ll figure out what went wrong, and we’ll try and put it right for next time we step back in.”
Once the dust settles, they’ll regroup at the gym and map out what comes next.