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VANCOUVER – Drew Dober could make history at UFC Fight Night 262, but that’s not his focus.
Dober (27-15 MMA, 13-11 UFC) meets Kyle Prepolec (18-9 MMA, 0-3 UFC) in a lightweight bout on Saturday’s prelims (ESPN+) at Rogers Arena in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Dober is tied with Dustin Poirier for most knockouts in UFC lightweight history at nine. He is currently on a three-fight losing skid, with his most recent knockout win coming over Ricky Glenn at October 2023. With Poirier retired, Dober is no longer competing with Poirier and could hold sole possession after Saturday.
“I was obsessing over it for an extended period of time, like I wanted that record, and I always felt like I was competing with Dustin,” Dober told MMA Junkie on Tuesday. “He’s retired. I’m like, ‘Oh! I can get that,’ but actually no, I stopped thinking about it.
“My knockouts come from not thinking about it, and I’m just performing. When I started being strict and having that expectation of knocking people out, it just wasn’t happening. So, I’ve been wrestling, I’ve been doing jiu-jitsu, I’ve been trying to find armbars. The punching power still exists, but I’m not obsessing over it now.”
Prepolec is in search of his first UFC win and has never been knocked out. That being said, does Dober think a knockout win over Prepolec is possible?
“I think we’re going to be doing a muay Thai fight in 4-ounce gloves,” Dober said. “It’s going to be a lot of fun and he’s super talented, but he does get hit a lot – and so do I. I think the UFC puts people together to have Fights of the Night, and this is going to be one of them. But we’re going to find out really quick who punches harder, and I might also dabble into a little bit of clinch or wrestling game, too.”
