Halquist Production's final CageSport MMA for 2009 took place Dec 5th at the Emerald Queen Casino with 10 pro MMA cage fights in front of a capacity crowd. Just before the main event, a poignant moment of silence was observed as well as an honorary 10 count of the bell for the 4 fallen Lakewood officers slain the week previous. R.I.P.

The main event was a lightweight contest between undefeated Lloyd Woodard out of Missoula, Montana's Dogpound Fight Team and Sterling Ford of Yelm, WA's Victory Athletics. The first round went to Ford with superior striking and cage control but in the second Woodard got Ford down and spent much of the round working for a kimura ending. Ford was able to escape but when in the third the same situation arose, Woodard kept at it and finished the submission despite Ford's valiant effort to get out of it. Woodard comes away with a big win over a very talented fighter and moves to 7 and 0.

Originally, "Fast" Eddy Ellis out of the United Fight Team in Lacey, WA was to fight in the main event against Welterweight Jory Erickson of Missoula's Great Northern Fight Club. However, Ellis blew an ACL just days prior to the event and matchmaker Rich Guerin called upon veteran JT Taylor to take his place. The fight was pushed to the co-main event and turned out to be an excellent technical battle. Taylor, head of Bend Oregon's Desert Dogs as well as owner of the Desert Brawl fight promotion, came out firing leg kicks that clearly hurt Erickson and forced the Wolf Point, MT native to take the fight to the ground. But while Erickson was able to take Taylor down numerous times throughout the fight and maintain top position, he was unable to inflict any serious damage. The wily Taylor meanwhile worked from the bottom firing elbows and causing stalemate upon stalemate that forced the ref to repeatedly stand the fighters back up where the same pattern of leg kicks and takedowns would occur. After 3 rounds, it went to the judges and Taylor's gameplan paid off as two of the judges awarded him the bout 30-27, while the third gave it to Erickson 29-28.

The fight of the night went to the ladies in a thrilling contest that brought the crowd to its feet. The 135 lb bout was between Julie Pena of Spokane's Sikjitsu camp (being cornered by fighter Lyle "Fancy Pants" Beerbohm) and Victory Athletics' Stephanie Webber (being cornered by fighter Miesha Tate). The tone of the fight was set when Webber came out and caught Pena square on the chin, wobbling "The Venezuelan Vixen" and signaling the war was on. Pena recovered and for the next round and a half these two warriors stood toe to toe throwing hard leather. Midway through the 2nd, Webber dropped Pena to the ground but Pena was able to reverse, laid down some ground and pound, and then adeptly secured an armbar submission for her 2nd pro victory.

Brian Halquist Productions have released their 2010 fight dates at the Emerald Queen starting off January 10th with the 75th edition of the longest running pro boxing series in the nation. Battle at the Boat 75 will have David "El Torrito" Torres vs Raymundo Beltran in the 10 round main event plus fights featuring Walter "2 Guns" Wright, Tacoma's Mike "Imagine" Gavronski, Olympic alternate David "Thunder" Clark, and George Foreman III. Foreman the 3rd is the son of former World Heavyweight Champ, George Foreman, who will be on hand to take in the action.

The next Cagesport MMA show will be held on Feb 20th.

For more info, visit halquistproductions.com or emeraldqueen.com.