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In a historic moment for the UFC, Dan Ige is stepping in to fight Diego Lopes in the UFC 303 co-main event after Brian Ortega withdrew just hours before the fight due to illness.
The promotion announced the move after UFC insider Ariel Helwani reported that a fight between Lopes and Ige was in the works rather than the scheduled event of Lopes vs. Ortega.
Helwani also noted that Ige did not weigh in yesterday, so the last-minute switch was highly unprecedented.
According to Helwani, Ige's team got word of the attempted switch around 7:30 p.