NEW YORK CITY – UFC middleweight 's performance got the crowd at Madison Square Garden to react loudly, just not in the way he had hoped.
The undefeated wrestling phenom improved to 7-0 as a professional MMA fighter with a unanimous decision win over the veteran in the featured bout of Saturday's pay-per-view event. Nickal won the scorecards from all three judges, although the fight was much closer than the scores suggested. The 28-year-old scored neither a takedown nor a knockdown for the first time in his career and landed a total of 54 strikes throughout the contest – seven more than Craig.
After the win, Nickal spoke to the media backstage at Madison Square Garden to share his thoughts on the performance, why he thought it was great, the audience that booed him and chanted “overrated,” and a look ahead to 2025 throw and tell a story about him, my mother's amateur boxing career and more.
Check out the full media scrum in the video above.