Chase Hooper knows Viacheslav Borschev tapped to his submission at UFC St. Louis.
Hooper was set for his third fight at lightweight, and the American had gone a perfect 2-0 since moving up to the weight class. In the first round, Hooper dropped Borschev which surprised many, but Hooper says that was likely due to Borschev being worried about the takedown attempts.
“It is one of those things, a guy who is focused on knocking you out is a lot easier to hit than a guy who is focused on defense. I was just trying to get some respect on the feet, I feel like he was very hesitant on the feet with his striking. He was very weary of my shot, he was ready for me to wrestle off the bat, so assuming that we put the wresting further down in the game plan and we set it up by faking that shot and you know what they say, a broken clock is right twice a day, so that is one of my two times,” Hooper said to BJPENN.com.
After Hooper dropped Borschev, he landed heavy ground-and-pound in the first round and dominated him. However, he couldn’t get the finish in the opening round, which didn’t surprise Hooper as he knew how durable Borschev was.
“We were expecting that going in, I knew he was thought mentally and physically, so I wasn’t super surprised. But, I was surprised Keith did let it go as long as he did. Slava would move when Keith told him to, he was still in the fight just not offensively. I was not super surprised by how durable he was,” Hooper said.
In the second round, Chase Hooper got Viacheslav Borschev down again and started landing some heavy ground-and-pound shots. He ended up locking in a submission and it appeared Borschev tapped, but he immediately protested it.
In the moment, Hooper says he felt Borschev tap, and watching it back, he does believe it was a tap.
“There was one clear tap, I don’t know what that was about. I felt like his grappling was more primitive than I was expecting, I thought I would be up against more on the ground with his scrambles. I had no intention of letting go until the ref told me to stop, so that’s on Keith. My responsibility is to go until the ref tells you to stop and it’s the ref’s responsibility to tell us when to stop. He definitely tapped me, but I can’t say whether it was the famed Brazilian tap or not, trying to maybe get me to let go, but I wasn’t going to do that, I had it locked in. The consensus I’ve seen is whether it was a tap or not, it’s not like it was a close fight,” Hooper said.
With the win, Hooper says he plans to spend time with his wife and welcome his first child into the world. Once he’s ready to fight, he isn’t sure who is next but isn’t in a rush to fight a ranked opponent.
“That was his first time getting finished… There are like 90 guys in lightweight, it’s one of the toughest divisions in the sport, but it starts to move me up towards the top end of the unranked. I think there are tiers and I moved up to the next tier. It opens up the more known vet guys, potentially two wins away from being in the ranking,” Hooper said.
