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History · 2025 · UFC 312: Du Plessis vs. Strickland 2 · Dricus Du Plessis vs Sean Strickland
From the tape · 8 Feb 2025

Dricus Du Plessis vs Sean Strickland

UFC 312: Du Plessis vs. Strickland 2 · Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Result

Dricus Du Plessis beat Sean Strickland

Method
Decision - Unanimous
Round
5 of 5
Clock
5:00
Middleweight TitleTitle fightMainReferee · Marc Goddard

We published no prediction for this bout. Everything on this page is the official record and the tape it was fought on — the result, the round-by-round counts, the judges’ cards where they exist and the sportsbook line where one was published. Our graded calls start in 2026 and live on the public record.

Red corner Dricus DuPlessis“Stillknocks”Team CIT · Pretoria, Gauteng
VSOn the tape
Blue corner SeanStricklandXtreme Couture · Anaheim, California
Middleweight Title5 rounds8 Feb 2025
The story going in
  • Comes in on a 8-fight win streak.
  • Has finished 5 of 16 UFC wins.
  • Has finished 6 of 8 UFC wins.
  • 22 UFC bouts deep — 14 more than Plessis.
24-3
Record
31-7
−2 yr31
Age
33
6' 1"
Height
6' 1"
76″
Reach
76″
Switch
Stance
Orthodox
8
UFC bouts
+1422
+44%6/875% of wins
Finishes
5/1631% of wins
Team CIT
Gym
Xtreme Couture
Pretoria, Gauteng
From
Anaheim, California
Vitals, record, nickname and camp come from the public UFC fighter register and are current, not a snapshot of fight night. UFC bouts, finish rate and every storyline line are counted off the official UFC fight record. A tick marks the side holding the raw edge in that row — longer reach, taller, younger, more bouts, a higher finish rate. It is a fact about the tape, not a prediction, and rows with no clean comparison (record, stance, gym, hometown) carry no tick at all. Any row we cannot fill on both sides is left out rather than half-drawn. Streaks, bout counts and finish rates are as they stood going into this fight — this bout and everything after it is excluded from the count.

Round by round

Every round the fight went, shaded by where the significant strikes actually landed — the takedowns, control time and knockdowns beside them, and how the three judges scored that round.

UFCStats · per round

5 rounds of tape

Round 15:00 of action
Dricus Du Plessis20 sig landed
HEAD25%5 of 25BODY30%6 of 10LEGS45%9 of 10
Sean Strickland16 sig landed
HEAD62%10 of 41BODY31%5 of 7LEGS6%1 of 1
20 of 45
Sig.
strikes
16 of 49
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 20Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 16Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Plessis firstBen Cartlidge10–9Sal D'Amato10–9Clemens Werner10–9
Round 25:00 of action
Dricus Du Plessis31 sig landed
HEAD23%7 of 31BODY23%7 of 10LEGS55%17 of 19
Sean Strickland29 sig landed
HEAD52%15 of 35BODY28%8 of 13LEGS21%6 of 6
31 of 60
Sig.
strikes
29 of 54
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 31Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 29Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Plessis firstBen Cartlidge9–10Sal D'Amato10–9Clemens Werner10–9
Round 35:00 of action
Dricus Du Plessis39 sig landed
HEAD28%11 of 46BODY36%14 of 15LEGS36%14 of 18
Sean Strickland24 sig landed
HEAD75%18 of 39BODY21%5 of 6LEGS4%1 of 2
39 of 79
Sig.
strikes
24 of 47
1 of 1
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:05
Control
0:00
Distance 39Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 24Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Plessis firstBen Cartlidge10–9Sal D'Amato10–9Clemens Werner10–9
Round 45:00 of action
Dricus Du Plessis21 sig landed
HEAD62%13 of 54BODY24%5 of 7LEGS14%3 of 5
Sean Strickland28 sig landed
HEAD82%23 of 43BODY18%5 of 8LEGS0%0 landed
21 of 66
Sig.
strikes
28 of 51
0 of 0
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 21Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 28Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Plessis firstBen Cartlidge10–9Sal D'Amato10–9Clemens Werner10–9
Round 55:00 of actionEnded 5:00
Dricus Du Plessis36 sig landed
HEAD39%14 of 37BODY36%13 of 17LEGS25%9 of 10
Sean Strickland31 sig landed
HEAD77%24 of 54BODY19%6 of 7LEGS3%1 of 1
36 of 64
Sig.
strikes
31 of 62
0 of 1
Take-
downs
0 of 0
0:00
Control
0:00
Distance 36Clinch 0Ground 0
Where it
happened
Distance 31Clinch 0Ground 0
Judges · this round · Plessis firstBen Cartlidge10–9Sal D'Amato10–9Clemens Werner10–9

Significant strikes, takedowns, control time, knockdowns and submission attempts exactly as UFCStats recorded them for this bout, round by round. Zone percentages are that round’s landed head, body and leg counts over their own total — raw arithmetic, nothing modelled or smoothed. A round in which a fighter landed nothing shades empty and reads zero; it is never filled in from the round before.

The cards, totalled

The judges’ final totals, the media’s cards beside them, and how these judges usually score. Their round-by-round 10–9s are with the rounds above.

Official card

Unanimous Decision

Referee · Marc Goddard
Dricus Du PlessisSean Strickland
Official totals — Dricus Du Plessis first
JudgeTotal
Ben Cartlidge2.1 avg spread · 45% wide49–46
Sal D'Amato2.1 avg spread · 46% wide50–45
Clemens Werner2.1 avg spread · 50% wide50–45

Each judge’s round-by-round scores sit with the round they belong to, in the round-by-round section above — switch a round there and the three cards for it change with the stats.

Media cards — 26 scored, Dricus Du Plessis first · unofficial

Paul Fontaine WrestlingObserver.com50–45
Plessis Ben Duffy Sherdog.com50–45
Plessis Jay Pettry Sherdog.com50–45
Plessis Dominik Durniat ddreporter Tv50–45
Plessis Jake Noecker Home of Fight50–45
Plessis Shakiel Mahjouri CBS Sports50–45
Plessis Nick Baldwin theScore50–45
Plessis Nolan King MMAJunkie.com50–45
Plessis Steve Duncan mma.uno50–45
Plessis Drake Riggs Uncrowned50–45
Plessis Keith Shillan Sherdog.com50–45
Plessis Daniel Yanofsky The Sporting News50–45
Plessis Chris De Santiago Sports Illustrated50–45
Plessis Danny Segura MMAJunkie.com50–45
Plessis Ryan Frederick WrestlingObserver.com50–45
Plessis John Pollock POST Wrestling50–45
Plessis CombatPress.com50–45
Plessis Matthew Wells MMAJunkie.com50–45
Plessis Seán Sheehan SevereMMA.com50–45
Plessis Damien Bartonek Fox West Texas50–45
Plessis Dayne Fox Sherdog.com49–46
Plessis Kendrick Johnson MMAWeekly.com49–46
Plessis Scott Fontana New York Post49–46
Plessis Alexander K. Lee MMAFighting.com49–46
Plessis Devin Tejada Sherdog.com49–46
Plessis Zane Simon The MMA Vivisection48–47

Fan vote · unofficial

50-45 Du Plessis · 69%49-46 Du Plessis · 15%48-47 Du Plessis · 4%50-44 Du Plessis · 4%48-47 Strickland · 1%

362 fan cards submitted to MMA Decisions.

Official cards come from the UFCStats fight record and MMA Decisions. Media cards and the fan vote are MMA Decisions’ own collection and are not official. Judge tendency figures are that judge’s whole recorded history, not this bout — they are context for how a card was scored, never a claim that it was scored wrongly.

Takedowns

Takedowns

The level change — head to head

Career UFC takedown rates. Red corner left, blue corner right.

Dricus Du Plessis

2.22takedowns / 15 min
2.22 / 15m
TAKEDOWNS
0.66 / 15m
4.35 / 15m
ATTEMPTS
1.06 / 15m
51%
ACCURACY
62%
0.70 / 15m
SUB ATT
0.10 / 15m

Sean Strickland

0.66takedowns / 15 min

Career UFC takedown rates exactly as UFCStats publishes them: takedowns landed per 15 minutes, completion rate, submission attempts per 15 minutes, and the share of takedowns tried on them that they stuffed. Attempts per 15 is the one derived figure — landed ÷ completion rate — and it is omitted wherever either input is missing. UFCStats writes 0% where no attempt was recorded at all, so a percentage of exactly zero reads “n/a” here rather than as a measured rate. “Field” is the average fighter in that weight class, or across every division where a class is too small to average. Rate bars run to the population’s 95th percentile (6.86 takedowns / 15m); a fighter above it pins the bar. Percentages are drawn on their own axis.

Ranked in Middleweight

The market story

Where the price started and where it finished — the sportsbook consensus, with the vig removed. We captured no price series for this bout, so there is no chart to draw.

Dricus Du Plessis↑ +11.2pp
open 54.3%close 65.5%
Sean Strickland↓ −11.2pp
open 45.7%close 34.5%
0%50%100%
OpenClosing consensus (BFO, vig removed)

Dricus Du Plessis opened at 54.3% and closed at 65.5% (+11.2pp), with Sean Strickland moving the other way by the same amount — the two are one de-vigged pair, so they always sum to 100%. There is no line between those two points because nobody recorded one: we hold the open and the close for this bout, not the days in between.

Show the numbers
CornerOpen (US)Close (US)Open %Close %Move
Dricus Du Plessis-130-21754.3%65.5%+11.2pp
Sean Strickland11017745.7%34.5%−11.2pp
Opening and closing moneylines from BestFightOdds (data/refs/bfo_fighter_moneylines.csv), one row per fighter per bout, de-vigged pairwise so the two corners sum to 100% · dated 2025-02-09 on the odds record (1d from the card date; the nearest day inside a two-day window is used, never a guess) · scraped 2026-06-10. No price series was captured for this bout, so no line is drawn between the two points.
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