St. Pierre dominates in Montreal

STEPHEN BRUNT
April 20, 2008 at 12:45 AM EDT

MONTREAL — Talk about your two solitudes.

In early hours of the evening, the streets of downtown Montreal were eerily silent as the city suffered through the agony-ecstasy-agony of the Canadiens 5-4 playoff loss to the Boston Bruins. At home, in the bars, in restaurants where they wouldn't normally let the din of television interfere with fine dining, it was all about the Habs.

Except in the place that they normally call home.

Inside the Bell Centre, where the Ultimate Fighting Championship was making its long-awaited Canadian debut, no hockey scores were mentioned, no highlights were shown on the big screens, no hints of the outside sports world crept in, no concession was made to the historic local obsession — and the truth is, no one seemed to be complaining.

For the 21,000 who filled the place, the largest live crowd in UFC history, this was the national coming out party for the sport of mixed martial arts, and those who care about the multi-discipline fight game care about it a great deal.

They had come here from all across the country and beyond, and have been just as easy to spot this weekend as Canadiens' fans decked out in the blue, blanc et rouge. Their uniform is nearly as distinctive: young men with shaved heads, tattooed arms, muscled up bods in tight t-shirts decorated in aggressive slogans.

It might not be fully mainstream yet, but don't dare call it a cult sport — unless you're willing to acknowledge that this is one very large, and growing cult.

The focus of the night was local hero George St. Pierre, and unlike the Habs he didn't disappoint.

Making his entrance for the main event, a welterweight title rematch with American Matt Serra, St. Pierre was greeted as ecstatically as any of the great boxing champions who have made Montreal their home. With the crowd alternating between deafening chants of "GSP, GSP", choruses of "Ole, Ole, Ole" — and briefly, "[Expletive] You Serra", St. Pierre — who wore a fleur de lys on his trunks, and has another tattooed on his right calf - dominated from the opening moments.

He took Serra to the canvass in the first seconds of the first round, and punished him for most of the five minutes, leaving him with a blackened left eye. The second round featured more of the same, with St. Pierre on top of Serra, pounding his head and kneeing him in the side until referee Yves Lavigne was forced to intervene, stopping the fight, and awarding St. Pierre the organization's championship belt.

"Before I say anything, I want to say something to my friends in Montreal," St. Pierre said from the ring. "This is the most beautiful day of my life."

As for the rest of the show, which started at 8:00 p.m. and lasted well past midnight, it provided what the slickly-packaged UFC always does: action, displays of exceptional technical skills in wrestling, jiu-jitsu, kickboxing and boxing, a safe, well-regulated environment, knockouts, submission holds, choke holds, and lots and lots of blood.

The only rumbles of discontent came during one of the preliminary bouts, when one of the fighters, apparently disinclined to be beaten to a bloody pulp like some of the other brave but overwhelmed combatants on the card, opted to spend three rounds backpeddling and throwing the odd punch. He was booed mercilessly, and mocked by his opponent.

In a business built on delivering exactly what it promises, you can bet he won't be asked back.

(Globe and Mail)


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