Allen stuns Muniz with submission in impromptu UFC main event

It's all but guaranteed that Brendan Allen will find himself in the UFC middleweight rankings next week - and he took an extremely unlikely route to get there.

Allen became the first to submit Brazilian jiu-jisu ace - and No. 11-ranked middleweight - Andre Muniz in Saturday's UFC Fight Night main event, tapping him out with a rear-naked choke at the 4:25 mark of the third round in Las Vegas.

With the end of the fight near, Allen caught a kick from Muniz, slammed him to the mat, and immediately got into side control. From there, he took Muniz's back, wrapped his arm around Muniz's neck, and eventually locked in the choke.

The fight was promoted to main-event status midway through the card after Nikita Krylov was forced out of the original headliner against Ryan Spann due to illness. Neither Allen nor Muniz had been in a UFC main event before Saturday.

Throughout almost 15 minutes of action, it was clear that Allen had an advantage in the striking department. He wobbled Muniz in the first round and generally landed the better shots. But the biggest surprise - and the most impressive part of Allen's breakthrough performance - was that he outgrappled Muniz.

He defended Muniz's three takedown attempts and scored one takedown himself. Midway through the second round, Allen reversed a Muniz takedown attempt, wound up in top position, and stayed there for multiple minutes until the frame ended.

With the victory, Allen extended his winning streak to four and improved to 9-2 in the UFC.

Muniz suffered his first loss in the promotion, dropping to 5-1. The Brazilian earned a spot in the rankings at 185 pounds by beating the likes of Ronaldo "Jacare" Souza, Uriah Hall, and Eryk Anders.