Buckley hit a spinning back kick to flatten Impa Kasanganay in the second round of a preliminary bout on the Fight Island 5 card Saturday in Abu Dhabi.
The middleweight from St. Louis raised his lifetime record to 11-3 with eight knockouts.
“He was coming hard, he had heavy pressure, so I said,’ Why not just throw it?’ And I got it. I landed,” Buckley said in his postfight interview in the Octagon.
His electrifying combination power and precision lit up MMA Twitter:
The kick also was a big hit with UFC president Dana White, who surprised Buckley with a postfight visit while the fighter was waiting to be interviewed again.
Buckley did not receive “all the bonuses,” which is what Twitter wanted White to give him, but he was awarded $50,000 for a Performance of the Night. He was angling for double that right after the fight, however.
“Make that $100,000, because that was a Fight of the Night, too,” he said in the Octagon interview.
