That sound you heard during the final few seconds of the first round in Strikeforce’s first female main event fight was Gina Carano’s skull changing shape under the pressure of repeated blows from Brazilian powerhouse Cris “Cyborg” Santos.  She overwhelmed Carano with her strength from the opening moments on the bout and, despite two completely failed takedown attempts that succeeded only in pulling Carano on top of her, she managed to keep things mostly on the feet where she had a clear advantage. 

After hurting Carano several times with some big bombs, she really poured it on in the last ten seconds of the first round after passing Carano’s half-guard.  As Gina lay curled up in tight little ball against the fence waiting for it to be over, Santos unleashed a vicious flurry of unanswered right hands.  Stopping the fight at that point was clearly the right decision, as Carano was far from being able to ask referee Josh Rosenthal what the fuck his problem was.

Afterwards Scott Coker did his best to pretend that he was just fine with Cyborg winning, suggesting there were plenty of promotional opportunities for her, such as telling women’s magazines about her workout plan.  Because doesn’t every woman want to look like Cyborg Santos?

Meanwhile, the other women in the hunt are calling ‘next’ on both Santos and Carano, with Golden Glory fighter Marloes Coenen saying she’ll get the first shot at the new champ, maybe by the end of the year.

In other action on the night…
 

(Round 1. Rounds 2 & 3 are after the jump.)

Maybe you missed it, but Sanchez/Guida and Lytle/Burns weren’t the only good fights on TV this weekend.  At Friday night’s Strikeforce Challengers event Jorge Gurgel and Connor Heun slugged it out for three rounds in a bout that seemed mediocre on paper but wound up being the highlight of the Showtime broadcast.  

If you pay attention early on, two things become very apparent: 1) Pat Miletich is the best fighter-turned-color man/technical analyst that there is, and 2) Gurgel is still committed to being the ground guy who chooses to stand and bang in an effort to entertain fans and “please promoters,” as Stephen Quadros puts it.  That’s at least in part of what got him bounced from the UFC (okay, really it was losing fights, but that was a symptom and not the disease) and yet here it results in him having the fight of the night.  It makes me wonder, is Gurgel, for better or worse, a fighter crafted by the sensibilities of fans and promoters?  And if so, is that necessarily a bad thing?