Controversy

Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2 Scorecard: Who Really Won the Split Draw?

The 10-8 got the headlines. Round 4 decided the fight - and on our card it belongs to Alexa Grasso.

By Jashan Oct 9, 2026 · 7 min read

At a glance

1ResultSplit draw - Grasso retains the flyweight title
2The cardsBell 47-47, D'Amato 48-47 Shevchenko, Kamijo 48-47 Grasso
3The 10-8Mike Bell scored round 5 10-8 for Grasso - the only 10-8 on any card
4The swing roundRound 4: Kamijo had Grasso, Bell and D'Amato had Shevchenko
5The numbersGrasso led 84-80 in significant strikes; Shevchenko led 8:37 to 2:39 in control time
6Our card48-47 Grasso

What was at stake

Six months earlier, at UFC 285 on March 4, 2023, Alexa Grasso had pulled off one of the biggest upsets in the division's history. Priced around +500, she took Valentina Shevchenko's back off a spinning kick and finished her at 4:34 of the fourth round - officially a rear-naked choke, widely described as a face crank. It ended a reign that had run through seven title defences.

The UFC booked the rematch straight away as the headliner of the first Noche UFC, on Mexican Independence Day weekend. It was Grasso's first defence, and the bookmakers still made Shevchenko the favourite, at around -175. Both came in with one fight to prove: Grasso that the first one was no fluke, Shevchenko that it was.

The official scorecards

Here is every judge's card, round by round. Scores are written Grasso first.

Judge	R1	R2	R3	R4	R5	Total
Mike Bell	9-10	10-9	9-10	9-10	10-8	47-47
Sal D'Amato	9-10	10-9	9-10	9-10	10-9	47-48
Junichiro Kamijo	9-10	10-9	9-10	10-9	10-9	48-47

Referee: Herb Dean. One card for each fighter and one even makes it a split draw; a drawn title fight leaves the belt with the champion.

Read the table across and the controversy shrinks to two cells. All three judges gave Shevchenko rounds 1 and 3 and gave Grasso rounds 2 and 5. Everything else comes down to round 4, where Kamijo went one way and Bell and D'Amato the other, and to how Bell scored round 5.

Bell had Shevchenko ahead 39-37 after four rounds. His 10-8 in the fifth pulled his card level at 47-47. Had he scored that round 10-9 like the other two judges, his card would have read 48-47 Shevchenko, and with D'Amato's card she would have left as champion by split decision. That is why the 10-8 became the story. It is not the whole story.

Round by round

Round 1 - Shevchenko (all three judges)

A tight, tactical opener. Shevchenko landed first; Grasso switched to southpaw and found a home for her jab. The difference was grappling: Shevchenko completed a takedown and spent 1:20 in control, at one point on Grasso's back. Official numbers: 14-12 in significant strikes to Shevchenko, one takedown from two attempts.

Round 2 - Grasso (all three judges)

Grasso's best round. Countering a left hook, she dropped Shevchenko with a right hand - the first knockdown anyone had scored on Shevchenko in 16 UFC fights - and then went to work in the clinch, landing all 17 of the significant strikes she threw there. Shevchenko recovered, took Grasso down and banked 3:03 of control, but the round had already been decided. Grasso out-landed her 28-15 in significant strikes and 86-62 in total strikes.

Round 3 - Shevchenko (all three judges)

Shevchenko's best round, and nearly the end of the fight. She took Grasso down, passed, and locked a mounted guillotine that came close to finishing it. Grasso escaped - the stats credit her with a reversal - but gave up her back, and Shevchenko held a body triangle and tried a late armbar. Shevchenko had 3:16 of control and the round's only submission attempt.

Round 4 - split (Kamijo: Grasso; Bell and D'Amato: Shevchenko)

The round the fight was really decided in, and the closest of the five. Shevchenko jabbed and shot; Grasso stuffed the first attempt and landed knees. Grasso then clinched her against the fence, slammed her down and attacked an armbar. She lost the position and Shevchenko ended up in her guard, where an elbow opened a cut beside Grasso's left eye. In the last minute Shevchenko tripped Grasso and took her back as she stood, and Grasso finished the round rolling for a heel hook. On the stat sheet it was almost dead level: significant strikes 20-19 to Grasso, total strikes 38-31 to Grasso, one takedown each, 0:58 of control for Shevchenko to 0:37 for Grasso.

Round 5 - Grasso (all three judges; Bell 10-8)

Shevchenko controlled the first three minutes on the feet and out-landed Grasso 23-20 in significant strikes for the round. Then a Shevchenko takedown attempt went wrong: Grasso came out of the scramble on her back with under 90 seconds left, locked a body triangle, hunted the rear-naked choke and finished on a face crank at the horn. Shevchenko never tapped. It was a clear Grasso round on every card - the question is only whether it was a 10-8.

The 10-8 everyone talks about

A 10-8 is meant for a round one fighter dominates - heavy damage, overwhelming control, or a fight that nearly ends - not a round that is lost for three minutes and won in the last ninety seconds. Almost nobody defended Bell's score. Dana White said There's no way in hell that was a 10-8 round, and on a judges' training call days later the Nevada State Athletic Commission's executive director, Jeff Mullen, said he did not agree with it either: If somebody is well ahead, it would take an incredible amount of damage to swing it back to a 10-8. John McCarthy later said Bell had told him privately that he made a mistake. Mullen still called Bell one of the best judges in the world, and no discipline was reported.

So the 10-8 was wrong, and fixing it alone hands Shevchenko the fight. But that assumes the judges' other calls were right - and the one call they disagreed on is round 4.

What the numbers say

The official statistics, round by round (Grasso first):

Round	Sig. strikes	Total strikes	Takedowns	Control	Knockdowns
R1	12 – 14	60 – 25	0/0 – 1/2	0:00 – 1:20	0 – 0
R2	28 – 15	86 – 62	0/0 – 1/1	0:20 – 3:03	1 – 0
R3	4 – 9	35 – 40	0/0 – 1/1	0:12 – 3:16	0 – 0
R4	20 – 19	38 – 31	1/1 – 1/2	0:37 – 0:58	0 – 0
R5	20 – 23	43 – 41	0/1 – 0/1	1:30 – 0:00	0 – 0
Total	84 – 80	262 – 199	1/2 – 4/7	2:39 – 8:37	1 – 0

Across 25 minutes Grasso landed more - 84 significant strikes to 80, 262 total strikes to 199 - and she won the clinch 31-6 in significant strikes. Shevchenko won the grappling: four takedowns from seven attempts to Grasso's one from two, and 8:37 of control time to 2:39. Grasso scored the only knockdown.

The stat sheet cannot show the two near-finishes, Shevchenko's guillotine in round 3 and Grasso's back attack in round 5, and it flatters control time that produces little. That is exactly why round 4 is so hard to call from numbers alone.

The media were as split as the judges: the MMADecisions tally of media scores came out 12 for Grasso and 11 for Shevchenko.

How we scored it

Round	MMA.SOCIAL	Why
R1	10-9 Shevchenko	Even on the feet; her takedown and back control decided it.
R2	10-9 Grasso	The knockdown and a 17-for-17 clinch outweigh Shevchenko's late control.
R3	10-9 Shevchenko	The mounted guillotine and over three minutes on top. Clear.
R4	10-9 Grasso	More strikes (20-19 significant, 38-31 total, 9-1 in the clinch), the round's biggest moment in the slam and armbar, and she finished it attacking a heel hook.
R5	10-9 Grasso	Won it in the last 90 seconds from the back, but Shevchenko had the first three minutes - not a 10-8.
Total	48-47 Grasso

Round 4 is a coin flip with an edge. Shevchenko's case is real: the elbow drew blood, she had 21 more seconds of control, and she was on Grasso's back late. But the cut came from guard, the back take came in the final minute and threatened nothing, and Grasso did more of the fighting for the other four minutes - she out-landed Shevchenko, stuffed her first takedown and put her on the mat with a slam before attacking an arm. We give the round to Grasso, which puts us with Kamijo and makes Grasso the rightful winner, 48-47.

That is the irony of the night. Bell's 10-8 was indefensible, yet his total landed on a draw that was closer to a fair result than a Shevchenko win would have been.

What happened next

Dana White called for a trilogy as "the right thing to do", and the two coached opposite each other on The Ultimate Fighter 32 before meeting a third time at UFC 306 on September 14, 2024. That one was not close. Shevchenko landed eight takedowns from twelve attempts, controlled Grasso for 16:04 of the 25 minutes and won a unanimous decision, 50-45 on all three cards, to take the title back.

Grasso, for her part, said after the second fight that she believed she had won the second, fourth and fifth rounds - the same rounds we give her.

The verdict

Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2 is remembered for a bad 10-8, but the fight was decided by a close, honest disagreement over round 4. Take away the 10-8 and the judges' own round calls give Shevchenko a split decision; give round 4 to Grasso, as we do, and Grasso wins 48-47. The draw stands as the official result. On our card, the champion did enough to keep her belt outright.

Full fight stats: Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2. More disputed cards: most split decisions, most draws and the fighters with the most disputed losses.

Sources

Questions

Who won Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2?

Officially no one. The fight on September 16, 2023 was a split draw - one judge for each fighter and one even - so Alexa Grasso kept the UFC women's flyweight title. On the MMA.SOCIAL card Grasso won 48-47, taking rounds 2, 4 and 5.

What were the Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2 scorecards?

Mike Bell scored it 47-47, Sal D'Amato 48-47 for Shevchenko and Junichiro Kamijo 48-47 for Grasso. All three gave Shevchenko rounds 1 and 3 and Grasso rounds 2 and 5; they split only on round 4.

Which judge scored the 10-8 in Grasso vs. Shevchenko 2?

Mike Bell scored round 5 10-8 for Grasso, the only 10-8 on any card. It turned his card from a 48-47 Shevchenko win into a 47-47 draw. Nevada's commission chief and Dana White both said the round was not a 10-8.

Would Shevchenko have won without the 10-8?

Yes. If Bell had scored round 5 10-9, his card would have been 48-47 Shevchenko, and with Sal D'Amato's card she would have won a split decision and the title. Whether that would have been right depends on round 4, which we score for Grasso.

Did Grasso knock Shevchenko down?

Yes, with a right hand in round 2. It was the first knockdown anyone had scored on Shevchenko in 16 UFC fights.

Did Grasso and Shevchenko fight a third time?

Yes, at UFC 306 on September 14, 2024. Shevchenko won a unanimous decision, 50-45 on all three cards, landing eight takedowns and controlling Grasso for more than 16 minutes to regain the flyweight title.