Chris Camozzi became a new cruiserweight champion on October 25, when he stopped Sawyer Depee in the main event of BKFC 67 at Denver Coliseum in Denver, Colorado. The former kickboxer and MMA fighter claimed the win by knockout, dropping his opponent with a big right hand. The fight ended at 1:06 into the opening round.
Camozzi, fighting out of Lakewood, Colorado, landed the title on his second attempt. Last September, the 37-year-old challenged Lorenzo Hunt for the same belt, but lost the fight by split decision. With the victory, the Alameda, California native improved to 3-1.
“I can’t put this into words,” said Chris Camozzi, who had Chuck Liddell in his corner. “This is the best moment of my career. Ever.”
30-year-old Depee of Lolo, Montana dropped to 5-3. The defeat snapped his three-fight winning streak.
In the co-main event, Cameron VanCamp (2-1) of Lebanon, IN defeated Brandon Girtz (1-2) of Minneapolis, MN by split decision. After five rounds at welterweight, one judge scored the fight 49-46 in favor of Girtz, while two other judges had 48-47 for VanCamp.
Among other BKFC 67 results, local middleweight Marcus Edwards (3-0) scored a unanimous decision against Pat Casey (1-2) of Springfield, MA. The scores were 50-43, 50-42 and 50-43.
As well, Denver’s lightweight Ramiro Figueroa (2-0) took the win against newcomer Ishiah Carson (0-1) of Galesburg, Illinois via first-round TKO. Dylan Schulte (3-1) of Helena, Montana stopped Derek Perez (2-3) of Belen, New Mexico in the second round at bantamweight.
Also on the card, Kathryn Paprocki (1-0) of Oberlin, Kansas successfully debuted at strawweight with the fourth-round TKO against Sydney Smith (1-3) of Bridgewater, Virginia. Local Andrew Strode (2-0) stopped Oklahoma City’s Chance Wilson (3-4) in the third round at flyweight.
In the main card opener, Andrew Yates (3-1) of Greeley, Colorado earned a UD against Jordan Christensen (3-5) of Centralia, Washington. After five rounds at welterweight, the scores were 49-45, 48-46, 49-45.
Atop the BKFC 67 prelims, Canadian lightweight Hasan Al-Ghanim (3-0) defeated Dusty Sparks (0-1) of Fort Smith, Arkansas by unanimous decision with the scores 48-47, 49-45 and 48-46. Kicking off the action, Nash Diederichs (1-1) of Canada eliminated Ruben Arroyo (0-1) of El Paso, Texas in the first round also at lightweight.
The lightweight bout between Darrian Leu-Pierre of Denver and Grady Wall of Village of Bergen, NY fell off.
The next bare knuckle boxing numbered event marks the promotion’s return to the United Kingdom with BKFC 68 on November 2 in Newcastle. Atop the fight card, Anthony Faulkner of the UK and Dawid Oskar of Poland battle it out for European title at heavyweight. In the co-feature, Matt Hodgson and Conor Cooke clash for the UK belt at light heavyweight.