UFC 334 lands at Madison Square Garden in New York on Saturday with a pair of championship fights topping a loaded card. Ciryl Gane makes the first defense of his heavyweight title against rising star Josh Hokit in the main event. The co-main event is one of the most significant fights in MMA history, as Amanda Nunes, widely considered the greatest women's MMA fighter of all time, returns from retirement to challenge former Olympian Kayla Harrison for the bantamweight championship.
The rest of the lineup is filled with familiar names, rising contenders and intriguing matchups, so betting interest should be heavy. These best bets went 4-1 at UFC 333 and now sit at 27-29 for the year, just under .500, with the goal of climbing back into the black. The one standing rule is that every selection must be priced at -250 or better, with odds via DraftKings Sportsbook.
Bilal Hasan is an enormous -1200 favorite against Luis Gurule, but the play is under 1.5 rounds at -175. Hasan shined on Dana White's Contender Series and won his UFC debut by knockout, while Gurule is just 1-4 since his own Contender Series stint. Roughly one in four flyweight non-title fights stops before the middle of the second round, and Hasan's debut win came at 2:28 of Round 2, just two seconds under the line. This matchup is built to keep his rise going, so a quick finish is the call.
Kevin Holland is among the trickiest fighters to figure out, able to look brilliant with his length and craft or get smothered by opponents who stay locked in. He is 8-10 since 2021, though 18 fights in that span is a staggering pace. Uros Medic is the moneyline pick at -155 behind a four-fight knockout streak, most recently a 30-second stoppage of Daniel Rodriguez in Serbia. Medic's power and speed can do serious damage if he gets inside Holland's reach, provided he sticks to the plan and refuses to be baited by Holland's antics.
Caio Borralho gets the moneyline nod at -155 against Yousri Belgaroui. Early in his UFC run, Borralho leaned on wrestling, once landing four takedowns and more than 10 minutes of control against Armen Petrosyan, though he has just one takedown across his last five fights. Both approaches have worked during his 8-1 UFC career, but the grappling path looks inviting here. Belgaroui is a superb kickboxer who has blitzed his octagon opposition, yet he has been taken down often in his short UFC stint, and Borralho is good enough to exploit that gap.
The co-main event is a genuine puzzle. Nunes could be dulled by rust after her time in retirement, while Harrison is working back from neck surgery, and there is no real way to know how either factor will show up. The lean is over 3.5 rounds at +105. Harrison will likely hunt takedowns and can probably hold Nunes down without finding a finish, and by about the third round both women could be tiring in a fight that turns scrappy. Everything points to the later stages, so the over is the play.
In the main event, Gane is the moneyline choice at -205. Hokit's climb has been admirable regardless of how one views his behavior outside the cage, but this is a major step up. Gane has been vulnerable to takedowns before, most notably against Jon Jones and Francis Ngannou, though the Ngannou fight was nearly five years ago and Gane has improved plenty since. He owns the size, reach and striking advantages, so if he stays upright, this could be a routine defense. Hokit showed real grit in his war with Curtis Blaydes, but that kind of brawl against Gane would go wrong in a hurry.
