Dan Ige and Punahele Soriano always envisioned a time where they could compete on the same UFC card. On Saturday, they will do exactly that in back-to-back main card fights.
Ige faces Damon Jackson in a pivotal featherweight matchup in the co-main event of UFC Vegas 67, while one fight earlier Soriano faces Roman Kopylov in a middleweight clash.
For Xtreme Couture head coach Eric Nicksick, seeing Ige and Soriano rise from the very early stages of their MMA careers to where they are now is a special moment.
“I think it’s one of the coolest stories in MMA right now, positive stories,” Nicksick told MMA Fighting. “You have two childhood friends that grew up together in Hawaii, they went to high school together, that had this vision and this goal for one another at such a young age. They used to talk about this on the school bus. ‘Hey man, maybe one day you and I will be fighting in the UFC together.’
“Having someone that is next to you with that same vision and same purpose, rowing the boat in the same direction, having the same goals, that one day maybe when you’re tired or you don’t feel like you can make it, the other guy is pushing you. I think that’s the relationship you see, that tight bond that those guys have.”
Both fighters made their way through the regional scene, scratching and clawing toward their dreams of making it to the UFC. Ige got there first, and Soriano arrived less than two years later. Coincidentally enough, they both earned their spots the same way — earning contracts on Dana White’s Contender Series.
Nicksick has seen Ige and Soriano grow up in MMA after making the move from Hawaii to Las Vegas to go all-in on their UFC dreams. From grade school, through the land of higher education, to the cages of mixed martial arts, Ige and Soriano have done it side-by-side.
“They went to college together, and then Dan — on a whim — decided to move out to Vegas and wanted to start training here at Xtreme Couture, and he was able to convince Puna to do it shortly thereafter,” Nicksick said. “Seeing these two in the room from the regional scene and growing, now they’re growing their families, so to see these guys growing up on couches to now in the co-main event [and featured bouts] back-to-back in the UFC from where they’ve been, I think it’s a pretty cool story.”
