UFC Light Heavyweight kingpin Magomed Ankalaev has lofty goals.<\/p>\n
First and foremost, the Russian champion has to deal with rival Alex Pereira in their rematch atop the upcoming UFC 320 pay-per-view (PPV) event<\/a>, scheduled for Sat., Oct. 4, 2025 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada. The two first faced off earlier this year at UFC 313, and Ankalaev was able to capture the crown<\/a> in a competitive decision.<\/p>\n A second victory over Pereira would extend Ankalaev\u2019s unbeaten streak to 15. Though it would only be his first defense, Ankalaev has already faced off with many of the division\u2019s contenders in his extended rise through the ranks. Given the circumstance, perhaps it\u2019s appropriate that \u201cBig Ank\u201d is already considering a Heavyweight move.<\/p>\n \u201cA heavy weight? These thoughts keep coming to me,\u201d He told Ushatayka<\/a>. \u201cI think a couple or three more fights. I think, two fights, and then I will think of moving to the heavy division.\u201d<\/p>\n Realistically, there aren\u2019t that many high-profile challenges remaining at 205-pounds for Ankalaev. The Jiri Prochazka vs. Khalil Rountree victor<\/a> will make for a worthy foe, and then there\u2019s a chance Khamzat Chimaev lives up to his word<\/a> and makes the jump to Light Heavyweight. Otherwise, the division is none too interesting<\/a>, and Ankalaev would be an immediate player among the big boys at Heavyweight.<\/p>\n We\u2019ve certainly seen other 205-pounders make the leap with good success. Could Ankalaev become the next two-division champion? He\u2019ll have to deal with \u201cPoatan\u201d first, but there\u2019s a reasonable chance we see him challenging the likes of Tom Aspinall sooner than later.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"UFC Light Heavyweight kingpin Magomed Ankalaev has lofty goals. First and foremost, the Russian champion has to deal…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":101653,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[570],"tags":[64,63,786,40762,785,85,1396],"class_list":{"0":"post-101652","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-fighting","11":"tag-latest-ufc-mma-news","12":"tag-mma","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-ufc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=101652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/101653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=101652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=101652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=101652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}