MMA Combat - DREAM 17 Adds Aoki vs. McCullough, Kitaoka vs. Freire

MMA Combat - DREAM 17 Adds Aoki vs. McCullough, Kitaoka vs. Freire

DREAM officials announced Friday that lightweight champion, Shinya Aoki (28-5-0) will officially defend his promotion title at DREAM 17 when he locks horns with former WEC lightweight champion, "Razor" Rob McCullough (19-7-0), September 24 at the Saitama Super Arena in Saitama, Japan.

Aoki is riding a five-fight winning streak heading into the contest and most recently defeated UFC veteran Rich Clementi via neck-crank in May of this year. McCullough bounced back from his WEC exit with consecutive wins in 2010, but was TKO'd in his Bellator FC debut by Team Nogueira representative Patricky Freire this past March.

Additionally, leg-lock specialist Satoru Kitaoka (28-10-9) will square off with Nova Uniao product Willamy Freire (19-4-0) in a lightweight bout. Kitaoka has won three straight fights since suffering back-to-back losses for the first time in an eleven-year career. The former Sengoku lightweight champ owns 15 wins by way of submission and is renowned for his crushing strength. Former Shooto champion, Willamy Freire, won eleven consecutive bouts from September 2007 to May 2010, but had his momentum halted this past January in his UFC debut where he was defeated by Waylon Lowe via unanimous decision at UFC - Fight for the Troops 2.

Dream 17 will also feature the quarterfinal match-ups for the promotion's World Bantamweight Grand Prix which still has four remaining slots to fill with former DREAM champ Bibiano Fernandez, as well as Japanese talents Kenji Osawa, Masakazu Imanari and 2011 Japan Bantamweight GP winner, Hideo Tokoro already confirmed for the bracket.

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MMA Combat - Dream 17 - Fight for Japan

MMA Combat - Dream 17 - Fight for Japan

May 29, 2011, the Saitama Super Arena, in Saitama, Japan hosted Dream 17 - Fight for Japan. The event featured the promotion's Bantamweight Tournament Quarterfinal and Semifinal match-ups, as well as a highly publicized appearance for Shinya Aoki who's opponent for the evening was uncertain until a mere 10 days ago when UFC veteran Rich Clementi took the fight on short notice.

Reports from the event, which did not air live in Japan or the United States, speak of Aoki (28-5-0) utilizing his superior grappling ability, achieving a back-mount on his opponent for nearly the duration of the first round, while peppering Clementi (40-20-1) with shots. "No Love" survived the first frame but experienced much of the same in the second when Aoki took his back once more; softening the American with blows, the Dream lightweight ace stopped Clementi at 2:32 of the second round via neck-crank.

In tournament action, Masakazu Imanari (23-8-2) and Hideo Tokoro (29-23-1) saw their way through to Bantamweight Grand Prix Finals defeating Kenji Osawa and Atsushi Yamamoto respectively in the semifinals.

Other results from the evening can be found below:

Bantamweight Tournament Semifinals
Masakazu Imanari def. Kenji Osawa via submission (Achilles lock) - Round 2, 0:58
Bantamweight Tournament Semifinals
Hideo Tokoro def. Atsushi Yamamoto via split decision

Shinya Aoki def. Rich Clementi via submission (neck crank) - Round 2, 2:17
Katsunori Kikuno def. Daisuke Nakamura via unanimous decision
Caol Uno def. Akiyo "Wicky" Nishiura via unanimous decision
Takeshi Inoue def. Koichiro Matsumoto via TKO (strikes) - Round, 6:51
Joachim Hansen def. Mitsuhiro Ishida via split decision

Bantamweight Tournament Quarterfinals
Kenji Osawa def. Takafumi Otsuka via split decision
Bantamweight Tournament Quarterfinals
Masakazu Imanari def. Keisuke Fujiwara via unanimous decision
Bantamweight Tournament Quarterfinals
Hideo Tokoro def. Yoshiro Maeda via TKO (corner's stoppage) - Round 2, 0:43
Bantamweight Tournament Quarterfinals
Atsushi Yamamoto def. Yusaku Nakamura via TKO (strikes) - Round 1, 8:43


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