Faith Van Duin broke the news on twitter Thursday she will be facing Amanda Bell at InvictaFC 12 on April 24 in Kansas City. The bout will most likely serve as a title eliminator for a 145 title match against Cyborg Justino in July.
Van Duin (4-1) is coming off her first pro loss to Arlene Belnclowe, but has racked up 3 finishes in her career. She won the Storm Damage one night tournament in 2013.
Bell (3-2) recovered from back to back losses to start her career to winning three straight including her first round TKO win over Maria Hougaard Djursaa at InvictaFC 9.
The bout joins the title match between strawweight champion Katja Kankaanpää and undefeated Brazilian Livia Renata Souza.
The card will stream on UFC Fight Pass.
More matches are expected to be announced in the coming days.
InvictaFC’s Amanda Bell took the award for 2014 after three straights wins, having gone 0-2 in 2013. She finished all of her opponents last year, and made headlines with a 37 second TKO over Marina Shafir. The win would get her re-signed to Invicta.
Bell a great outlook coming in 2015 and is becoming a star in her own right. Congratulations to Amanda Bell.
After a busy weekend of about two dozen pro WMMA fights across the world, we have seen some interesting changes to Unfiied rankings.
Since InvictaFC 9 happened Saturday, the Unified Committee decided to include Saturday’s results. However, the DEEP-JEWELS results on Monday morning will be included in December’s rankings.
Also several inactive fighters have been dropped off the list…
Coenen vs. Bucci courtesy Bellator
InvictaFC champion Cyborg Justino has been left off the featherweight rankings due to inactivity. Bellator’s Marloes Coenen regains the top spot after her win over Annalisa Bucci. The undefeated Pannie Kianzad is now #2 in the division, followed by Bellator’s Julia Budd (#3) and Invicta’s Faith Van Duin (#4).
Bucci’s loss to Coenen drops her a spot to #6, and Talita Nogueira takes her place at #5. Maria Hougaard’s loss to Amanda Bell drops her out of the top 10, with Bell debuting at #9.Tweet (#8) and Gabrielle Holloway (#10) round out the featherweight top 10.
The top 5 in the strawweights remain the same this month (TUF 20 fighters are exempt from dropping out); however, Karolina Kowalkiewicz’s win over Mizunki Inoue at Invicta gains the Polish fight the #6 spot. Inoue drops to #10.
Lacey Schukman’s inactivity in the atomweight division drops her out of the rankings, giving Jodie Esquibel the #5 spot after her win over Nicdali Rivera-Colonac this past weekend. The rest of the top 10 remains the same.
Bantamweight stays pat this month.
Several flyweight fighters will be dropping this month and in December to strawweight, so we expect some major changes come the end of the month.
It was a busy month as 56 fights happened in August shifting some fighters in most divisions.
Kianzad
Pannie Kianzad continues her unbeaten streak and moves up a spot to #3 in the featherweight division. Kianzad will be dropping to bantamweight in November to hopefully win the Cage Warriors 135 title.
With Amanda Bell’s first round TKO over Marina Shafir, she re-renters the 145 rankings at #12.
With her win over Lauren Murphy, Sara McMann moves up a spot to #6 at 135. Bethe Corriea debuts on the list at #11 after her TKO win over Shayna Baszler.
With her win over former InvictaFC title challenger Naho Sugiyama, Ayaka Hamasaki enters the atomweight top 10 at #3. Sugiyama drops to the #10 spot. Undefeated Catherine Costigan moves up to #11.
The top ten fighters at 115 and 125 stay pat this month. With around 60 pro bouts set and InvictaFC vastly approaching, we could see major changes come October.
It was a busy weekend for Invicta as they have have signed more talent to their featherweight roster.
Andria Wawro will join a re-signed Amanda Bell to 145 division. Kelly McGill and Cassie Criasno has also signed to Invicta but will be dropping to 135 for the promotion.
The signings comes on the heels of Bellator announcing their featherweight division and signing InvictaFC vets Marloes Coenen and Julia Budd. Cyborg Justino and Ediane Gomes are dropping to bantamweight and the new signees will compliment two divisions in need of talent.
WawroCrisano
Wawro (3-1) has a win over Crisano by decision. A five year vet of the sport, she submitted Jessica Miele this past June.
The Maryland native Crisano (2-2) took a recent trip to Brazil to gain some experience. Her last match ended in controversy as the referee awarded her opponent the win due to disqualification.
Bell (2-2) got her biggest win of her career, defeating Marina Shafir a few weeks ago. She has won back to back since her last Invicta outing. She had changed gyms.and has made a vast improvement in her fighting.
McGill made her pro MMA debut in June with a first round TKO over Leslie Rodriguez. She has a 7 second KO as an amateur.
No word on when the four will make their InvictaFC debuts. We are expecting more signings in the coming week.
After a few opponent changes, Marina Shafir will now has her toughest opponent yet in InvictaFC vet Amanda Bell.
Bell’s management announce the bout Tuesday. The fight will take place at Chaos At The Casino 5 in Inglewood, CA on August 10. Bell will be replacing Nikita Netjes, who has dropped out of the fight for an unknown reason.
Shafir (1-0) has yet to see the second round, with all but one win by armbar. She won her pro debut this past April with an armbar over Chandra Engel.
Bell (1-2) made her pro debut at InvictaFC 4, losing a decision to Taminkka Brents. She defeated Brittney Elkin this past April by first round rear naked choke. Bell has a TKO win over Shafir’s teammate Jessamyn Duke in the amateur ranks.
The card will also feature two more female bouts, including the MMA debut of Muay Thai champion Jemyma Betrian in a strawweight bout and 3-1 bantamweight Melanie Lacroix.
