Julia Avila is set to return for the first time in over a year, and she’ll do so as healthy as she’s been heading into a fight.
Avila is set to face Jacqueline Cavalcanti in a preliminary bantamweight contest at Saturday’s UFC Vegas 102 event. “Raging Panda” makes her first walk to the octagon since a submission loss to former champ Miesha Tate at UFC Austin in December 2023, where she suffered a major injury, on top of another injury she dealt with heading into ending an over two-year layoff. Speaking to MMA Fighting, Avila reflected on her biggest takeaways from the one-sided loss.
“I have incredible pain tolerance and drive, and I’m as stubborn as a mule,” Avila said. “I went into that fight injured. I shouldn’t have followed through with that fight. I completely blew out my right knee [in] the first five seconds of the fight. I couldn’t stand up, and she was riding my other leg, so anytime I tried to post to stand up, my knee would pop out of socket, and I tore my ACL.
“I went into surgery, I think, the next week after that, so I’m bionic now. I’ve had two ACL surgeries, but this time around, I didn’t have a kid [right after]. So I’m coming into this fight fully healthy. Everything’s 100 percent, so I have no excuses — and it’s not even an excuse that Miesha executed her game plan perfectly. I was in another interview before that fight, and they’re like, ‘Well, do you expect anything from Miesha?’ I’m like, ‘No, she’s going to come in, she’s going to shoot, she’s going to try to wrestle me, and I just have to be prepared for that. I know her game plan because it’s what’s worked for her, right? She doesn’t have to switch it up,’ and that’s exactly what she did.”
Avila has suffered ACL surgeries on both legs over the past few years, and after suffering the first injury, the 36-year-old and her husband welcomed their first child into the world. Avila admits she’s a bit stubborn, and was hoping to return sooner, but remained patient waiting for her opportunity to return.
With her confidence and overall health at a high level, Avila is ready to “punch somebody in the face again.”
“When I’m healthy, I am unstoppable,” Avila said. “I have to believe in myself, right? I feel like I’m always unstoppable, that’s why I still took the Miesha Tate fight. I’m like, ‘All I need is for her to think she’s brave and to stand up,’ because in the second round, she did. She got a little confident. She came up and we had one exchange, the only exchange that we had on the feet, and then she’s like, ‘Nah,’ and shot in, right?
“And I think she actually gave me props in an interview saying that in the single exchange that she had with me, she got more damage than five rounds with Holly Holm. So, you know what? I’m OK with that.”
The five-fight UFC veteran faces Cavalcanti, who enters the bout on a six-fight win streak, including a 3-0 start to her promotional tenure. In her most recent appearance, Cavalcanti earned a split decision against Nora Cornolle at UFC Paris this past September.
Avila hopes to pick up her first win since stopping Julija Stoliarenko in June 2021, and feels Cavalcanti is the right opponent to reintroduce herself to the division.
“I remember watching her on the Paris card in 2023, because my brother-in-law is Parisian, so I was like, oh cool, I’ll watch it, you know, whatever,” Avila said. But she has kind of flown under the radar. She’s very underrated, I think. She has great striking. She has a good length, but she’s not entertaining. So I think that’s why she’s gone under the radar, but it’s nothing I haven’t seen before.
“She’s an excellent striker. I’ve actually sparred against women that are on par with her. She reminds me of someone that I used to spar with, so I look forward to that. …
“Don’t sleep on me, motherf*ckers. This is that fight [to remind people who I am, and I fully expect her to run away from me — which is fine — try to draw me in, which would be smart, again, for her to try to draw me in because I barrel in, that’s what I know, what I do, and she’s a very good counter striker. So yeah, we’ll see how it plays out. I am aware of what’s happening, I just need to keep my cool.”
