Six First-Round Finishes. One Record No Heavyweight in UFC History Had Ever Built.
Sergei Pavlovich didn’t just go on a win streak — he went on a finishing streak so consistent it looked physically impossible. Six consecutive first-round stoppages inside the UFC octagon. Each opponent a legitimate heavyweight. Each fight over before most fans had found their seats. When Pavlovich was at his peak between 2019 and 2023, no heavyweight in the promotion was more dangerous to be in the same room with.
His overall record — 20 wins, 3 losses, 18 stoppages — tells most of the story. The 90% finish rate across a full career at heavyweight, against credible opposition, sets him apart from almost everyone who has ever competed in the UFC’s biggest weight class.
Early Life: Rostov to the Regional Circuit
Pavlovich was born on May 13, 1992 in Orlovsky, Rostov Oblast — a region in southern Russia with a deep tradition in combat sports. He began training Greco-Roman wrestling at the age of five, a discipline that gave him the positional awareness and body control that would later underpin his MMA game. After his military service, he added combat sambo to his arsenal, eventually earning a championship in Russia’s combat kung fu circuit — an unusual credential that hints at both his technical range and his appetite for competition.
His professional MMA career began in 2014 under the Fight Nights Global promotion, where he built a 12-0 record without a single defeat. That run culminated on June 2, 2017, when Pavlovich defeated Mikhail Mokhnatkin by unanimous decision to claim the Fight Nights Global heavyweight title. By the time the UFC came calling, he wasn’t an unknown quantity — he was a proven finisher with a regional title and an undefeated record.
The UFC Debut — and the Only Lesson Overeem Ever Taught Him
Pavlovich’s UFC debut on November 24, 2018, at UFC Fight Night 141, put him immediately in the deep end. His opponent was Alistair Overeem — a multiple-time world champion across multiple organisations, with one of the most decorated records in heavyweight history. The result was a TKO loss in round one.
It was the only time in his UFC career that Pavlovich would be stopped. Whether the loss recalibrated something in his approach, or whether the next phase was always coming, what followed was one of the most sustained finishing runs the UFC heavyweight division had ever seen.
Six Straight First-Round Stoppages: The Record
Starting with his victory over Marcelo Golm in April 2019, Pavlovich proceeded to stop six consecutive UFC opponents in the first round. The streak ran as follows: Golm (KO, April 2019), Maurice Greene (KO, October 2019), Shamil Abdurakhimov (TKO, March 2022), Derrick Lewis (TKO, July 2022), Tai Tuivasa (KO, December 2022), and Curtis Blaydes (TKO, April 2023).
The names escalate as the list progresses. Lewis was a top-five heavyweight and one of the most dangerous knockout artists in the division’s history. Tuivasa was a popular, hard-hitting Australian who had been finishing opponents himself. Blaydes — a wrestling-based heavyweight with genuine contender credentials — was dispatched at 3:08 of the first round.
By the time the Blaydes stoppage was official, Pavlovich held the longest first-round knockout win streak in modern UFC history. The statistical quirk that makes it even more remarkable: he had never been past round one in any UFC fight — win or loss — through his entire career to that point. Every single one of his UFC appearances had ended in the first three minutes.
For context on what kind of finishing rate that represents at heavyweight, see where he sits in our UFC heavyweight rankings breakdown.
What Made the Streak Work: The Right Hand
Pavlovich is a right-hand specialist in the most direct sense. His power punch is the straight right, loaded with weight transfer and timing rather than elaborate setup. What separates him from other heavy-handed heavyweights isn’t raw power alone — it’s the accuracy and disguise on the shot. He doesn’t wind up. He doesn’t telegraph. The punch arrives before the opponent has processed the threat.
At 6’3″ with significant reach, he can land that right hand from outside range and still generate full force on contact. The Derrick Lewis fight demonstrated this most clearly: Lewis, himself one of the most feared knockout artists in heavyweight history with 13 UFC KO wins, was stopped by a fighter who was arguably his superior at the one thing Lewis was known for.
Compare that finishing instinct to someone like Ciryl Gane, whose excellence at heavyweight comes from an entirely different place — movement, output, and technical range-finding. The two represent opposing philosophical poles of what a top-five heavyweight can look like. Pavlovich’s is simpler and more brutal, but at its peak, it was just as effective.
UFC 295: The Title Shot and the Aspinall Problem
On November 11, 2023, Pavlovich challenged Tom Aspinall for the interim UFC Heavyweight Championship at UFC 295 in Madison Square Garden, New York. It was the biggest fight of his career, and the co-main event of a card headlined by Jon Jones vs. Stipe Miocic.
The finish was fast. Aspinall — himself a first-round specialist who would go on to establish his own record for fastest interim title wins — caught Pavlovich early and completed the TKO. The fight was over in under a minute. Pavlovich had buzzed Aspinall briefly in the opening exchange, which showed he belonged at that level, but Aspinall’s speed and accuracy proved to be a different problem than anyone he’d faced in the streak.
The loss didn’t erase what he’d built. But it answered the specific question that his streak had raised: could Pavlovich beat a heavyweight who was equally fast, equally technical, and equally dangerous? Not that night.
Rebuilding: The 2025 Decisions
What followed the Aspinall loss showed something different about Pavlovich. He returned in 2025 and collected two decision victories — over Jairzinho Rozenstruik and Waldo Cortes-Acosta — fights that required him to work beyond the first round and grind out results against credible opposition.
Neither win came with the spectacular efficiency of the streak. But both demonstrated that Pavlovich is a complete heavyweight, not just a first-round bomb-dropper. He can pace himself, control range, and accumulate enough to win rounds if the early finish doesn’t come. That’s a more complete fighter than the one who walked into the Blaydes fight.
There’s a useful comparison here with Carlos Prates at welterweight — another fighter whose entire identity is built around the KO streak, who similarly faces the structural question of what happens when the early finish doesn’t materialise. The difference is Pavlovich has already answered that question, in the right direction.
What’s Next: Macau and the Title Picture
Pavlovich is scheduled to fight Tallison Teixeira on May 30, 2026, at Galaxy Arena in Macau — a significant market for the UFC and a card that will get eyeballs in Asia. Teixeira is a Brazilian heavyweight with real power and finishing ability, which means Pavlovich can’t approach this as a maintenance win. A first-round finish here would immediately regenerate the title conversation.
The interim heavyweight title situation — Aspinall has been the interim champion while Jon Jones has held the undisputed belt — has created a complicated picture at the top of the division. But anyone in the top three who wins convincingly forces that conversation. With his record, his finishing rate, and the Aspinall rematch as the obvious blockbuster fight, Pavlovich remaining relevant isn’t hard to see. He just needs to keep winning. And ideally, in round one.
Legacy and Where He Stands
At 34 and with a 20-3 record featuring 18 stoppages, Pavlovich is in the conversation for most dangerous heavyweight finisher of his generation. The six-fight first-round streak is a record. The 90% career finish rate, at heavyweight, against legitimate competition, is elite by any standard.
He hasn’t won a title. He lost his one title shot, and he lost it fast. That sits in the ledger. But the context matters: the opponent was Tom Aspinall, one of the fastest and most accurate heavyweight strikers in UFC history. Losing to him in a first-round exchange isn’t evidence that Pavlovich doesn’t belong — it’s evidence that Aspinall is genuinely elite.
If Pavlovich wins convincingly in Macau and forces the rematch, that fight writes itself. A first-round specialist against another first-round specialist, for the heavyweight title, with both fighters having a loss over each other in their records. The sport doesn’t often produce a cleaner narrative setup than that.
Whatever happens next, the six-fight streak is already in the history books. Nobody in the modern heavyweight era built anything like it.
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