Dana White Credits Wang Cong With Natalia Silva’s Wins
Dana White defended Wang Cong’s title shot by listing wins over Rose Namajunas, Jessica Andrade, and Alexa Grasso. Those three results belong to Natalia Silva, the woman Cong is fighting for the vacant flyweight title at UFC 332.
White answered the question during UFC 332 fight week in Salt Lake City.
“Well, she’s ranked number eight,” he said. “Rankings are, you know, if you look at what she’s done in her body of work, she’s, she’s ten and one.” Cong is 10-1 and is listed at No. 8 in the women’s flyweight rankings. The record and ranking he cited were hers. The resume that followed was not.
“I was just saying, she beat Rose Namajunas, she beat, Andrade, she beat, Grazo, and she beat Valentina Shevchenko in a kickboxing match,” White said. Cong has never fought Namajunas, Andrade, or Grasso in mixed martial arts. Silva beat Andrade by unanimous decision on September 7, 2024, beat Grasso by unanimous decision at UFC 315 on May 10, 2025, and beat Namajunas by unanimous decision at UFC 324 on January 24, 2026. Those are the last three wins on an unbeaten UFC run.
The kickboxing line is the one result White attached to the right fighter. Cong defeated Valentina Shevchenko by unanimous decision at Kunlun Fight 33 on October 31, 2015, and won the Kunlun Fight women’s lightweight title in that bout.
That fight was kickboxing, not MMA, and it came more than a decade before Saturday’s cage match. White treated it as part of the same case as the three champion wins.He then pointed at the division Shevchenko had cleared.
“So, you know, as you look through the roster and look at who Shevchenko has beat and cleaned out, she was, she, she’s, she’s the one that should be fighting on Saturday night,” he said. The booking already has both women in that fight. Silva was the planned challenger for Shevchenko before the champion withdrew with an injury, and Cong was moved into the vacant-title main event.
Cong’s actual UFC body of work is shorter than the one White described. She stopped Victoria Leonardo in 62 seconds in her promotional debut on August 24, 2024, then lost by rear-naked choke to Gabriella Fernandes on November 23, 2024. She has won four in a row since that loss, with decisions over Bruna Brasil, Ariane da Silva, Eduarda Moura, and Tracy Cortez at UFC 329 on July 11. None of those opponents is a former UFC champion.
Silva enters Saturday at 20-5-1, with an 8-0 UFC record and 14 straight wins dating to 2018. The UFC announced the matchup as the undisputed flyweight title fight after Shevchenko came out, and it headlines October 3 at Delta Center. White’s answer put Cong at No. 8 with a 10-1 record, then credited her with the wins that made Silva the other half of the fight. Cong and Silva meet for the vacant belt on Saturday night.
