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BOISE, Idaho – Alex Volkanovski kept his lengthy winning streak intact Saturday night, but he had to go through a little bit of an ordeal to do so.

The first part of the struggle came in the form of what he said was a pulled muscle near his ribs just a few days before the fight. The advice from his team and a doctor was to just suck it up and let his fight-night adrenaline carry him.

The second part of the struggle for Volkanovski (18-1 MMA, 5-0 UFC) was his opponent, Darren Elkins (24-6 MMA, 14-5 UFC). Volkanovski took a unanimous decision to close out the UFC Fight Night 133 prelims at CenturyLink Arena in Boise, Idaho. But it was far from easy.

In typical Elkins fashion, even when it looked like he might be able to be put away, he just kept coming.

“It was unreal,” Volkanovski told MMAjunkie after the fight, which stretched his winning streak to 15, including his first five in the UFC. “I wanted to get the finish – I always want to get the finish. But they’re giving me these tough guys. No matter how good you are, it’s going to be very hard to put Darren Elkins away.

“I think most of the guys I fight are like that. Some guys are just very hard to put away. I rocked him a couple of times, but I’m usually more persistent. I just didn’t want to go all out. … Just little things played on my mind. As much as I hated playing it safe and getting the decision, the crowd seemed to enjoy it.”

Elkins had won six straight fights, including an epic-level comeback win over Mirsad Bektic in early 2017 – so any time opponents think they might have him on the brink, they probably now have to wonder if they’ll be the next victim of an Elkins rally.

Volkanovski, though, who was fighting in the United States for the first time, said his injury forced him to take it easy.

“I thought I could’ve finished him, but I had to play it safe,” he said. “I threw a lot of fakes and jabs … I showed different tools as well as my aggressive style.”

After Volkanovski won with a 30-27 score and a pair of 29-28s, he was just a few fights away from being able to watch a three-time title challenger return from a two-year suspension. When he talked to the media, Volkanovski didn’t know yet that Chad Mendes (18-4 MMA, 9-4 UFC) would go on to knock out Myles Jury (17-3 MMA, 8-3 UFC) in the first round of the main card on FS1.

But Volkanovski always has been vocal about fighters who get extra help in MMA, and Mendes was suspended for testing positive for a growth hormone. He owned up to it and said he didn’t properly research the supplements he was taking, and accepted his two-year ban.

Still, Volkanovski would like a chance to get in the cage with Mendes.

“I’d like (Mendes),” he said. “He’s a big name. … He’s coming off a suspension. I don’t know the case in that situation, but I don’t like that sort of (expletive). He obviously got caught doing something. They’re the guys I want. Some of us are naturally strong. He got caught doing something, and that pisses me off. So I want him.”

Now he’ll wait to see if the UFC’s matchmakers think that’s a fight he should get.

For complete coverage of UFC Fight Night 133, check out the UFC Events section of the site.

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