Athletes
Rebuilding Pavlovich Ready To Show His Level
Top 5 Heavyweight Plans To Halt The Rise Of Waldo Cortes Acosta This Weekend In Shanghai
Following his UFC debut, Sergei Pavlovich rattled off six straight wins to ascend into contention in the heavyweight division. Each time he stepped into the Octagon, the Russian ran through his opponent, never venturing beyond the first round as went from dispatching fellow hopefuls to ranked standouts like Derrick Lewis and Curtis Blaydes.
The run of success landed him an opportunity to challenge for the interim heavyweight title at UFC 295, where he buzzed Tom Aspinall early, but fell soon after. When he returned seven months later against compatriot Alexander Volkov, Pavlovich was a little hesitant and got outworked, returning in a loss on the scorecards.
Earlier this year, the Top 5 fighter got himself back into the win column with a unanimous decision victory over Jairzinho Rozenstruik in Saudi Arabia, winning on the scorecards for the first time in more than seven years.
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“As we know, before that I had two misfortunes, so it was very important for me to get the victory, both mentally and physically, in order to get back on the right path,” Pavlovich said of his win in February, speaking with the assistance of translator Sergey Nagorny just a few days out from his pivotal showdown with Waldo Cortes-Acosta in Shanghai on Saturday.
“Maybe it’s a weird thing to say, but it was a positive effect that they had on me because it was a way for me to take a look into the process, into changing some things, changing the approach, the technique,” he said of the setbacks. “As the saying goes, if something starts breaking, if something doesn’t work, there is a way to fix it.”
Pavlovich’s approaching “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” from the opposite end of the spectrum feels more apropos when you dig deeper into his fight with Rozenstruik and the approach he carried into the contest in Riyadh earlier this year.
Though it was a departure from what everyone had come to expect from the Russian contender with hands the size of cinder blocks and ferocious power, it was precisely what Pavlovich was hoping to do: to go out there, fight smartly and strategically in order to secure a victory while not putting himself in a position to suffer any further “misfortunes,” as he calls them.
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“The idea was to utilize the three rounds — to go at my pace, my game plan, to go through striking and wrestling, if needed,” said Pavlovich, who earned 30-27 scores across the board to secure his 19th career win and seventh UFC win in 10 starts. “(I needed) to know what it’s like to control three rounds in the most uncomfortable way if need be.”
After righting the ship earlier this year against the veteran kickboxer, Pavlovich makes his second appearance of 2025 on Saturday, venturing to Shanghai for a date with the ascending Cortes-Acosta.
A member of the Dana White’s Contender Series (DWCS) Class of ’22, the Dominican heavyweight came out of the gates quickly, earning his contract in August and victories in October and November to establish himself as a new name to watch in the big boy division. After landing on the wrong side of things in a “too much, too soon” pairing with Marcos Rogerio de Lima to open his 2023 campaign, “Salsa Boy” rebounded with a victory over fellow DWCS alum Lukasz Brzeski and has used the last two years to add four more wins to his resume.
The 33-year-old former baseball player has posted a second-round knockout win over Ryan Spann and a unanimous decision triumph over grappler Serghei Spivac, where the improvements he’s made since his bout with de Lima leaped off the screen so much that they caught the eye of the man he’ll face this weekend.
“I’d say that his strongest aspects are his boxing and his wrestling defense,” Pavlovich said when asked his impressions of Cortes Acosta, keeping it succinct, but acknowledging his opponent’s dramatically improved wrestling defense as one of his strong suits.
While this weekend’s combatants are only separated by a couple spots in the current UFC Fighter Rankings, this does look and feel like a pairing between competitors at different levels within the heavyweight division, at least on paper.
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As good as Cortes Acosta has looked already this year and generally speaking over his last five fights, this is still the first time he’s shared the Octagon with a Top 5 talent, while the third-ranked Pavlovich opened his UFC tenure by facing Alistair Overeem and has been facing a steady stream of ranked opposition since his fourth fight in the promotion.
Although this could very well be Cortes Acosta’s coming out party and the moment he announces his presence as a legitimate threat in the heavyweight division, Pavlovich envisions this weekend’s main card clash being the instance where the emerging hopeful learns the painful, but important lesson summed up perfectly by Frankie Edgar all the way back at UFC 211: “There’s levels to this.”
“Yes, exactly that way,” affirmed Pavlovich when asked whether he sees this as a chance to teach Cortes Acosta the lesson Edgar taught to Yair Rodríguez in Dallas back in 2017.
And though he would very much like to get back to collecting rapid finishes and not spending too much time inside the Octagon, the rebuilding contender is ready to do whatever is necessary to add another victory to his resume this weekend.
“Of course we like to have exciting fights, show exciting finishes,” Pavlovich began. “With every fight, the idea is to come out there and make it exciting and quick, but I’m ready for all three rounds.
“I’m excited and I’m happy to come out on Saturday and see how it goes.”
UFC Fight Night: Walker vs Zhang took place live from Shanghai Indoor Stadium in Shanghai, China on August 23, 2025. See the final Prelim & Main Card Results, Official Scorecards and Who Won Bonuses - and relive the action on UFC FIGHT PASS!