Jinh Yu Frey Edges Ashley Cummins in Invicta FC 39 Main Event; Atomweight Title Vacated

Jinh Yu Frey may have been victorious in the Invicta FC 39 main event on Friday, but she walked out of Memorial Hall in Kansas City, Kansas, without her atomweight title.

Frey (9-4) lost her championship belt on the scales Thursday when she came in .8 pounds overweight. Since she missed weight, Frey was stripped of her title and on Friday, only opponent Ashley Cummins was able to win it. Turns out, Cummins (7-5) didn’t do enough in the three cageside judges’ eyes over the course of five rounds because each official favored Frey 48-47, thus resulting in the title becoming completely vacant.

Cummins started off strong in the contest as she landed the harder punches and controlled most of the pace of the fight in the clinch. Frey seemed out of sorts early and was beaten to the punch repeatedly, but the former champ came on strong down the stretch with vicious punching and did just enough to win. After her triumph, Frey, disgusted that she missed weight, said that it might be time to move up from atomweight to 115 pounds.

Miranda Maverick has been on a roll lately, having won two straight, both via submission. On Friday night in the co-feature, “Fear The” Maverick did whatever she wanted against veteran Pearl Gonzalez. While Maverick (7-2) obliged “The Chi-Town Princess” by striking with her, but she made it look easy whenever she took Gonzalez (10-5) down. Maverick threatened with submissions routinely, but Gonzalez while avoided them all, she was mauled on the canvas. However, it was a landslide on the judges’ scorecards; Maverick won via tallies of 30-27 (twice) and 30-26.

Alesha Zappitella (6-2, 1 NC) was dominant against fellow atomweight Kelly D’Angelo as she not only relied on her strong wrestling base, she beat “Wildfire” at her own game. “Half Pint” gladly struck with D’Angelo (4-3) and beat her to the punch repeatedly, and whenever she took her foe down, D’Angelo was lost at sea. Zappitella won via unanimous verdict with scores of 30-27 (twice) and 29-28.

Erin Blanchfield came into her flyweight contest with Victoria Leonardo as a jiu jitsu player, but “Cold Blooded” lived up to her nickname by clobbering her foe with head kicks. Blanchfield dropped “Fury” with a left kick to the face early in the first, but Leonardo (6-2) somehow remained conscious. After a dominant opening frame, Blanchfield flattened Leonardo with another wicked left high kick to the dome, ending the battle at the 2:06 mark of the round.

Atomweight Jillian DeCoursey used a much better overall striking game and multiple takedowns to offset Linda Mihalec and her jiu jitsu background, winning a unanimous nod along the way. “Lionheart” easily fended off every submission attempt Mihalec (2-1) threw at her, this after taking “F109) down repeatedly in all three rounds. One judge favored DeCoursey (4-2) 30-27 while the other two officials saw it for her 29-28.

In the opening bout of the night, bantamweight prospect Monica Franco improved to 2-0 with a relatively lopsided win over Kristina Pettigrew. “Fearless” used great defense on the feet to nullify most of the attacks from Pettigrew (1-1), and when she let her limbs go, she landed in droves. “The Predator” never got going and Franco wound up winning easily 30-27 (twice) and 30-26.