Greg Hardy thought he had Tai Tuivasa hurt. And maybe he did. But he didn’t have him hurt enough.
Hardy, 32, suffered the second knockout loss of his career, as Tuivasa, of Sydney, put him down with a counter left hook just 67 seconds into their heavyweight fight at UFC 264 in Las Vegas Saturday night. The finish came after Hardy rocked Tuivasa with a right hand and aggressively moved forward for a finish. Tuivasa regained his footing and threw the perfect two-punch counter to put Hardy on his back.
Hardy went down from the shot and then started to turn away from the swarming Tuivasa. But the Australian didn’t let him off the hook and landed several blows to finish the fight.
The win extends Tuivasa’s win streak to three, which is his longest since 2018. He has completely bounced back from a three-fight skid in 2019 to Junior dos Santos, Blagoy Ivanov and Serghei Spivac.
Hardy, who began his professional mixed martial arts career 2018, falls to 4-4 in the UFC.