UFC Wichita bonuses: Niko Price, Beneil Dariush score with fantastic finishes

Niko Price almost never goes to the scorecards and he’s being rewarded handsomely for his efforts.

For his stunning first-round knockout of Tim Means, Price was given one of the evening’s $50,000 Performance of the Night bonuses at UFC Wichita on Saturday.

As expected, Price and Means went right at each other, with Price landing the heavier shots at first before being slammed to the mat by Means. The ground fighting was inconclusive and when the action returned to the feet, Price used Means’s aggression against him, stopping him with a counter right hook and ground-and-pound with 10 seconds remaining in round one.

It was the third Performance of the Night bonus for Price who has yet to go to a decision in eight UFC appearances.

The other Performance of the Night bonus went to Beneil Dariush for his second-round submission of Drew Dober. The streaking Dober had no answers for Dariush on the mat and the black belt took his time maneuvering into mount and eventually finishing with a triangle armbar as Dober scrambled to escape the position. This is the second Performance of the Night for Dariush, a five-year UFC veteran.

Main event heavyweights Junior dos Santos and Derrick Lewis lived up to that billing, trading big strikes for about a round-and-a-half to earn the UFC Wichita Fight of the Night award. It was dos Santos who landed the more telling blows, badly wounding Lewis with a spin kick to the body in round one and finishing the job with an overhand right to the head in round two.

Dos Santos has earned six UFC fight night bonuses in his career and is now tied with Lewis and Cain Velasquez for the most knockouts in UFC heavyweight history.