Daniel Zellhuber amazed by Francisco Prado's durability, but surprised fight wasn't stopped

MEXICO CITY – Daniel Zellhuber showed out for 15 minutes at UFC Fight Night 237, something he didn’t expect to happen.

The UFC lightweight prospect thought either the referee, doctor or corner of opponent Francisco Prado was going to interfere at some point in their main card bout given the amount of damage he was dishing out. Zellhuber (15-1 MMA, 3-1 UFC), who defeated Prado (12-2 MMA, 1-2 UFC) in a unanimous decision, was surprised that the fight wasn’t stopped.

“I’m definitely surprised it went the full 15 minutes,” Zellhuber told MMA Junkie at his post-fight news conference. “Between the second and the third round, when my coach was giving me instructions, I was kind of looking across the octagon because I thought, ‘All right, his eyebrow is starting to go down.’ I was like, ‘No, they’re going to stop the fight.’ And when they took the corners out and the doctor stepped in, I thought, ‘OK, the fight is over.’ But then the doctor said keep going, so I said, ‘OK, let’s keep fighting.’

“At that point, I realized I probably wasn’t going to knock him out because I got him with good knees, I landed a clean head kick, crosses, a couple of nice hooks, and he’s really a tough guy. He’s a very hard hitter. I’ve never felt a hand like that. So praises to him, but yeah, I’m surprised the fight wasn’t stopped.”

Even though to many the fight seemed one-sided, two of the three judges that night scored the bout 29-28, Zellhuber, giving one round to Prado. Zellhuber couldn’t care less about the scoring, as long as he got his hand raised.

“To be honest, I don’t care,” Zellhuber said. “I knew I had won the fight. A couple of people told me the judging had been kind of weird, so I’m not surprised that this happened. At the end of the day, I felt that I just won the entire fight and everybody thinks the same, so I just really don’t give a f*ck.”

For more on the card, visit MMA Junkie’s event hub for UFC Fight Night 237.