On Sunday, Deep 114 went down at the Korakuen Hall in Tokyo, Japan. In the main event, the newly crowned champion Sakai made quick work of Mizuno, TKO’ing him in under a minute. In the co-main event, Matsushima returned to Japan for the first time in years and defeated his last minute replacement opponent with a series of soccer kicks. something he hasn’t be able to do since he’d been competing under the unified rules. Deep also announced that Deep 115 will be a Deep vs Black Combat collaboration, this time taking place in Tokyo. The event is scheduled to have 7 Deep vs 7 Black Combat fights and 4 of Deep’s champions are already set to take part. For those who missed Deep 114, it is available to their Youtube members and on U-Next.
Sakai defends title, stops Mizuno
In a rematch from 2019, where Sakai was DQ’ed for an illegal knee, Sakai made quick work of Mizuno and TKO’d him in under a minute. Before the finish, Sakai was able to land some big punches before overwhelming Mizuno and forcing the ref to step in. This marks his first title defense since becoming the Megaton Champion in November of last year and puts him on a 4 fight win streak since losing to Saint in 2021.
After the win, the champion addressed the crowd and among other things, mentioned that he doesn’t have long left so he’d like to represent Deep at the Deep vs Black Combat event like the other champions and that he’d like to face Josh Barnett in the future.
Matsushima returns to Japan, makes Deep debut
Matsushima made a big statement on Sunday in his Deep debut, making it look easy against Takashio, who deserves credit for taking the bout on late notice, since Matsushima’s original opponent Gabriel Silva pulled out after he missed his plane and was unable to make weight. In route to a first round finish, he landed some good strikes, got it to the ground where he moved to full mount, and eventually dropped Takashio with a punch and when the ref didn’t stop it, he followed up with two soccer kicks that ended it.
This victory comes after Matsushima’s 2 bouts in the Road to UFC last year, where he went 1-1, with the defeat being by split-decision and before that he went 3-2 in One Championship. As this shows, Matsushima has been competing abroad regularly and this marked his first fight in Japan since 2018. With his return to Japan, Deep has gained a relatively young fighter who has international experience and has competed on a consistently high level for some time now. If he continues to win, he could realistically be challenging Ushiku for the Featherweight title in the near future. When addressing the crowd, a reserved Matsushima expressed his gratitude to Takashio on accepting the match on late notice.
Hibino makes it 4 in a row
Armed with otaku-esque glow sticks, Rizin veteran Hibino made his way to the cage where he earned a unanimous decision victory over Road to UFC participant Jinnosuke Kashimura. The match got off to a rough start though, with Hibino getting hit with an accidental low blow that took him a long time to recover from. Once things got restarted, the two bantamweights struck for a bit before Jinnosuke got it to the ground. However, Hibino was able to use the cage to get on top and wound up inside Jinnosuke’s guard. It is worth pointing out that Jinnosuke landed some really solid elbows from his back and kept busy, but Hibino was able to escape when he went for a triangle. In the second that match took place mainly on the feet and Hibino was able to land the cleaner strikes.
Quick Results
- Ryo Sakai defeated Tatsuya Mizuno via TKO @ 0:42 of RD 1
- Koyomi Matsushima defeated Ryujii Takashio via TKO @ 1:54 of RD 1
- Kimihiro Eto defeated Shunta Nomura via UD
- Kaito Yoshimura defeated Hiroto Gomyo via SD
- Taito Kubota defeated Rikiya Matsuzawa via Sub (Kimura) @ 3:27 of RD 1
- Takeshi Izumi defeated Sho Kogane via UD
- Shunsuke Miyabi defeated Sho Hiramatsu via UD
- Junya Hibino defeated Jinnosuke Kashimura via UD
- Kyouma Akimoto defeated Ryuki Asahina via Sub (RNC) @ 4:08 of RD 1
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