{"id":161920,"date":"2025-09-22T17:51:11","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T17:51:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/161920\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T17:51:11","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T17:51:11","slug":"julianna-pena-my-head-says-amanda-nunes-my-heart-says-kayla-harrison","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/161920\/","title":{"rendered":"Julianna Pe\u00f1a: &#8216;My head says Amanda Nunes, my heart says Kayla Harrison&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Julianna Pe\u00f1a still has her eyes on UFC gold.<\/p>\n<p>Pe\u00f1a (13-6 MMA, 8-4 UFC) lost her bantamweight title to Kayla Harrison (19-1 MMA, 3-0 UFC) <a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/article\/ufc-316-results-kayla-harrison-043713841.html\" data-ylk=\"slk:by submission at UFC 316;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas;outcm:mb_qualified_link;_E:mb_qualified_link;ct:story;\" class=\"link  yahoo-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">by submission at UFC 316<\/a> in June. Harrison is expected to welcome Amanda Nunes back to the octagon for her first title defense, and Pe\u00f1a hopes she can face the winner.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>But who would she rather fight again?<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I think a trilogy with Amanda would be the best case scenario just because we have shared so much time inside the octagon, but then I would also love to fight Kayla again because I know that I can beat her,&#8221; Pe\u00f1a said on <a href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/Q8uBWthtdJ4?si=n0cxJ4kr4jU99MZV\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:&quot;The Ariel Helwani Show.&quot;;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">&#8220;The Ariel Helwani Show.&#8221;<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I feel like given the circumstances that I&#8217;ve been facing for these injuries that I&#8217;ve been trying to get over the hump and get inside the octagon and actually fight, I think if I could get into a fight camp healthy with having all of these injuries healed, I can beat her. I know I can.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>Pe\u00f1a split her two appearances against Nunes (23-5 MMA, 16-2 UFC), scoring an upset submission in their first fight at UFC 269, then losing a lopsided decision in their rematch at UFC 277. Looking at the landscape at 135 pounds, Pe\u00f1a doesn&#8217;t think it&#8217;s impossible to find herself in another title bout in her next fight.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I haven&#8217;t seen anybody else say that they want to fight Amanda or Kayla except me,&#8221; Pe\u00f1a said. &#8220;I&#8217;m willing to fight either one of them. If I could jump right into an immediate rematch with either one of them, I think that would be the best-case scenario. I don&#8217;t see any roadblocks to it, but maybe the promotion has other ideas. I&#8217;m not sure.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Pe\u00f1a was asked to give her prediction for the matchup between Harrison and Nunes.<\/p>\n<p>Advertisement<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;My head says Amanda, and my heart says Kayla, so I don&#8217;t know,&#8221; Pe\u00f1a said. &#8220;May the best woman win. I don&#8217;t have anything personally against either one of them.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>This article originally appeared on MMA Junkie: <a href=\"https:\/\/mmajunkie.usatoday.com\/story\/sports\/ufc\/2025\/09\/22\/ufc-julianna-pena-opinion-prediction-kayla-harrison-vs-amanda-nunes-women-bantamweight-title-fight\/86288896007\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Julianna Pe\u00f1a reveals pick for Kayla Harrison vs. Amanda Nunes;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Julianna Pe\u00f1a reveals pick for Kayla Harrison vs. Amanda Nunes<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Julianna Pe\u00f1a still has her eyes on UFC gold. Pe\u00f1a (13-6 MMA, 8-4 UFC) lost her bantamweight title&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":161921,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[444],"tags":[30297,49,48,641,80212,30298,638,82,640],"class_list":{"0":"post-161920","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-mma","8":"tag-amanda-nunes","9":"tag-ca","10":"tag-canada","11":"tag-fighting","12":"tag-julianna-pena","13":"tag-kayla-harrison","14":"tag-mma","15":"tag-sports","16":"tag-ufc"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161920","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=161920"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/161920\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/161921"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=161920"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=161920"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=161920"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}