Beneil Dariush simply wasn’t himself in the biggest fight of his career.
A potential No. 1 contender opportunity turned into a nightmare quickly for Dariush when he faced off with Charles Oliveira in the co-main event of UFC 289 this past Saturday in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. In a brief, but entertaining fight, Dariush was caught by an Oliveira head kick that dropped him to the mat and he failed to recover en route to a first-round TKO loss.
Dariush entered that bout on an eight-fight win streak that put him on the cusp of a lightweight championship opportunity, but now he has to regroup. And he’s not entirely sure where to begin.
“I watched the fight,” Dariush told Submission Radio (transcription via Denis Shkuratov). “I’m not one of those who doesn’t really watch the fights. I watched it back and I just know that’s not the best version of me. I don’t know, for whatever reason that day I was not on. I can’t explain it.
“Not going to give too many excuses because I don’t want to take from Charles. He was the better man that night. He had a great victory. But that was definitely not the best version of me.”
Dariush made it clear that, to his knowledge, he didn’t enter the fight with any preexisting injuries or maladies of note. A veteran of 22 UFC fights, Dariush has a good gauge of how he’s feeling before a fight and he swears that the trouble didn’t start until he was in the cage.
“There was nothing really that didn’t work out,” Dariush said. “What was weird was like, I can’t explain it, but at some point it felt like my body was in—like, my eyes were good, but my body was slow motion. So everything I wanted to do, I was one step behind. I couldn’t pull off the things that I was seeing. And then just balance maybe wasn’t the best either for some reason. I don’t remember the last time I threw a kick and slipped. I can’t explain it. I just didn’t feel like myself.”
The loss cost Dariush his chance to challenge Islam Makhachev and there’s no telling how far back in the contenders’ line he stands now with his impressive win streak snapped. It’s a potentially devastating setback for Dariush, who hadn’t lost a fight since March 2018.
But Dariush didn’t dwell on the loss for long as he had the good fortune of bringing his family with him to fight week in Vancouver.
“I had my moment in the shower where I was just super sad and on the verge of tears,” Dariush said. “But then I got out of the shower, looked at my family, grabbed my two daughters, and I walked out like I’m gonna live to fight another day and I’ll become a champion another day. It won’t be today.”
The Oliveira fight marked Dariush’s first outing of 2023. There was an eight-month gap between a win over Mateusz Gamrot and UFC 289, and Dariush hopes that he doesn’t have to wait that long for another fight this time.
“At this point I just need to know that I’m healthy and I can get back inside that octagon,” Dariush said. “Please, before the end of the year. I don’t want to have to wait until next year to fight, because it’s been so slow for me to get fights. So ideally, I would like to fight before the end of the year.”
It took Dariush eight straight wins to even push his name to the front of the contender conversation, so time is of the essence for the 34-year-old if he aims to regain that position. His past three wins presented a strong case as he won decisions over Gamrot, Tony Ferguson, and Diego Ferreira, but a first-round loss on a big stage may have overshadowed his achievements.
Dariush remains optimistic, though he knows that it’s not just about getting back to winning, it’s about how he looks in those wins.
“One or two fights and I could be back in the picture,” Dariush said, “I think one more fight, people will be like, ‘Oh crap, yeah, this guy’s good.’ I definitely think so. I don’t think I’m gone from the rankings, right? It’s not like I disappeared. So there’s that.
“I think what’s gonna be necessary for the next fight, is the performance. Because if I just go out there and barely win, people will be like, ‘Eh.’ But if I go out there and I put on a great performance, then people will be like, ‘OK, this guy, he still has it.’ I think that’s what I need is, like, a very good performance.”