The Valentina Shevchenko Rematch Amanda Nunes Needed to Settle

Amanda Nunes had already knocked out Ronda Rousey and Miesha Tate by September 2017. She was the bantamweight champion, the woman who ended the sport's biggest star in 48 seconds. But there was still a question mark hovering over her reign, and it had a name: Valentina Shevchenko.

Their first meeting at UFC 196 in March 2016 went to a split decision in Shevchenko's favor, though the scorecards were tight and the fight took place at a catchweight of 135 pounds before Nunes won the belt. When they ran it back at UFC 215 in Edmonton for Nunes' title, the rematch carried real stakes. Shevchenko had improved since their first clash, moving to flyweight would come later, and this was her chance to prove the first result was no fluke.

What unfolded over five rounds was the most competitive title defense of Nunes' bantamweight career. Shevchenko worked behind a sharp jab and crisp footwork, picking angles and refusing to give Nunes clean entries. Nunes had the heavier hands and landed the harder shots when she closed distance, but Shevchenko made her pay for every exchange. The third round was razor-close, with both women landing meaningful strikes in the clinch. By the championship rounds, fatigue was visible on both sides, but neither backed down.

The judges scored it 48-47 across the board for Nunes—a split decision that could have gone either way depending on how you valued volume versus power. It was not the dominant performance Nunes would later become known for. It was a grind, a fight that required her to dig deeper than she had against Rousey or Tate. Shevchenko walked out of that cage believing she had done enough to win, and plenty of observers agreed with her.

Why does this fight matter more than people remember? Because it was the last time anyone pushed Nunes that hard at bantamweight for years. After UFC 215, she went on to flatten Raquel Pennington, Rousey, and Holly Holm before moving up to featherweight and knocking out Cris Cyborg. The Shevchenko rematch was the blueprint for how to survive against Nunes—stay mobile, don't trade in the pocket, make it a chess match—but almost no one at 135 pounds had the skill set to execute it.

Shevchenko moved to flyweight after the loss and built her own dynasty there. Nunes cemented herself as the greatest women's fighter of all time. But for one night in Edmonton, it was close enough to go either way, and that tension is what made Amanda Nunes truly great. She won the fights she was supposed to dominate, and she also won the ones that could have been taken from her.