Jon Jones celebrates after winning the UFC heavyweight championship against Ciryl Gane at UFC 285 … [+]
UFC 295 took an enormous hit on Wednesday morning when the November 11 fight card lost its original main event, UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones vs. ex-champion Stipe Miocic.
UFC CEO Dana White announced the cancelation of the bout on Twitter, saying, “Jon Jones was training last night, got injured, he was wrestling and he tore the tendon that connects your pec to to the bone, off the bone. [Jones is out] eight months, going to need surgery. He’s out.”
With Jones out of the fight, the new UFC 295 main event will be ex-UFC light heavyweight champion Jiri Prochazka vs. former UFC middleweight titleholder Alex Pereira for the vacant UFC light heavyweight crown. That fight was initially UFC 295’s co-main event.
The UFC 295 pay-per-view card picked up a new co-main event with Jones’ injury. That fight sees Sergei Pavlovich facing Tom Aspinall for the interim UFC heavyweight crown. Pavlovich is the No. 2 fighter in the official UFC light heavyweight rankings. Aspinall checks in at No. 4 in those rankings.
Pavlovich has a career record of 18-1. He has won his past six fights via first-round knockout. The 31-year-old fighter’s only loss came in his UFC debut when Alistair Overeem knocked him out in the first round. Aspinall is 13-3 in his MMA career. The 30-year-old is 6-1 in the UFC with six stoppage wins. Five of those victories have come in the first stanza and one in the second. Aspinall’s only UFC loss is a 2022 knee injury TKO setback to Curtis Blaydes. Aspinall returned from that injury in July of this year and scored a first-round TKO win over Marcin Tybura. Pavlovich comes into UFC 295 following an April 2023 TKO win over Curtis Blaydes.
As of today, this is what the UFC 295 pay-per-view card looks like:
Alex Pereira vs. Jiri Prochazka – for the vacant light heavyweight title
Sergei Pavlovich vs. Tom Aspinall – for the interim heavyweight title
Jessica Andrade vs. Mackenzie Dern
Diego Lopes vs. Pat Sabatini
Matt Frevola vs. Benoit Saint
Denis Kevin Borjas vs. Joshua Van
Stephen Erceg vs. Matt Schnell
Loopy Godinez vs. Tabatha Ricci
Jared Gordon vs. Mark Madsen
Nurullo Aliev vs. Mateusz Rebecki
Viacheslav Borshchev vs. Nazim Sadykhov
Dennis Buzukja vs. Jamall Emmers
John Castaneda vs. Kyung Ho Kang
UFC 295 takes place at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The PPV portion of the fight card airs on ESPN+ pay-per-view.
