Five minutes into a conversation with Julianna Pena and you think, OF COURSE she comes from Spokane, Washington -- shes boilermaker stock. The fifth-ranked UFC bantamweight seems more forged than born of woman. As she speaks, her words gain velocity, her voice volume, her tone dynamics -- as if, in her Las Vegas hotel room, where she waits to fight Cat Zingano at the UFC 200 prelims, shes applying a bellows to her speech.Its been an eventful couple of years in and out of the cage for the 26-year-old, whos currently undefeated in the UFC. Theres been devastating injury, convalescence, a headline-grabbing arrest and, recently, legal reprieve. But little of that really matters if she can beat Zingano, currently ranked No. 4, and get one step closer to fighting former coach Miesha Tate for the belt.Penas main coach, Rick Little of Sik Jitsu Fighting Systems, says shes a sponge, the most coachable fighter hes ever worked with. But much of what the bantamweight has learned hasnt come from the gym.One thing you cant teach is heart, she says of her relative inexperience. (Pena has been fighting only since 2009.) One thing you cant teach is true grit. One thing that Ive never been is a quitter.As she tells it, Penas story is really one of family, particularly of strong women. She was the youngest of four growing up in far eastern Washington, and the so-called Venezuelan Vixen learned early that scrappiness and a certain level of aggression were not only helpful, but critical, to making it. And it wasnt just a lesson gleaned from sibling beatdowns. As she grew up, watching her mother closely yielded some valuable knowledge. Namely:One, you dont spend your childhood as a migrant field worker, picking whatever fruit is in season, to become dependent on anyone other than yourself for anything. Two, when you take a job as the lone female in the gladiatorial world of union boilermakers, youre going to get pushback. Youre going to have to fight those who want you to quit, who try to make your life a little harder so youll leave. You push through.And three, nothing good ever happens after midnight. (More on that later.)I think that my moms experience has shaped the way that I am as a fighter and how I am as a person, Pena says. Its part of the reason she and her siblings have an amazing work ethic, she says.But its an ethic best suited to solo achievement. When she was in high school, she was constantly frustrated at the lack of hustle by her teammates in soccer, softball and volleyball. Pena didnt stumble across martial arts until she was out of school, when she followed her oldest sister to a cardio kickboxing class at Littles gym in Spokane.She walked into cardio kickboxing a little young and slightly overweight, says Little, who demonstrated a few combos for her and the other women in class. Little said that most women tend to hit with little rabbit punches and forget the combo after the third punch, but Julianna just starts cracking them.When Little asked Pena where shed trained before, she just stared at him, wide-eyed. What do you mean? You just showed me, she said. She was offered entrance into the MMA program immediately, and like most of her ilk, she found love at first punch.What attracted me to MMA was that it was an individual sport, says Pena, and the only person that I had to count on was myself. I didnt have to worry about being a part of a team where they werent trying their hardest and they didnt want to win.With no background in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, wrestling or stand-up combat, Pena took in everything at once. She embraces her pan-combat-style approach, rather than considering herself at a disadvantage to women who started in, say, Muay Thai at age 11.I feel like Im not necessarily more dominant in one area, Pena says. Im comfortable wherever the fight goes because I just learned how to fight MMA as a whole.A look at her 7-2 pro record bears this out -- a mélange of strikes, armbars and chokehold submissions leading to victories. But it was punches that brought her (along with a host of other female competitors)?into mainstream consciousness. At The Ultimate Fighter 18 finale in 2013, under the guidance of Tate, she beat Jessica Rakoczy.That win was the last good thing for a while. Only a few months after taking TUF 18, Pena suffered a catastrophic injury during training, traumatizing nearly every piece of connective tissue in her right knee and forcing her out of UFC 171. It would be a year before she fought again.?After returning, Pena beat Milana Dudieva in April 2015, then Jessica Eye this past October. She used that opportunity to blast longtime sort-of nemesis Ronda Rousey, saying after the fight, Im 6-0 in the Octagon, and so is Ronda Rousey. Dana White calls her the Mike Tyson of MMA. Well, Im Evander Holyfield. So Im right here, Ill be your huckleberry.Its a bold assertion. Maybe the MMA gods, still enchanted by Rousey back then, didnt like Penas comment. Maybe it was just bad luck, or, as Pena would say, being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Whatever it was, it came down like a hammer in the wee hours of Dec. 20, 2015.Pena faced off in a street fight against what she says were some 20 drunken guys outside a bar in Spokane, at least one of whom had allegedly slapped her butt earlier in the night. The fight itself ended with her and her badly beaten training partner, Joshua Gow, making a run for a friendlier bar nearby. Ironically, thats where things went south.Pena alleges that the bartender gave her and Gow permission to use the bathroom to clean up Gows face. On the way, however, the bouncer allegedly stopped the pair and told Gow to leave.Now Im throwing a fit and drunk and panicking and screaming, like, Why wont you help this guy? This is his human right to use the bathroom, Pena says. He says, You both can get out. So were fighting with the bouncer, and all of a sudden the bouncer picks me up and throws me off of a ledge. I end up falling on my ass and dropping every content that was in my purse. ... I got up off the ground, and I teep-kicked him basically to say, Get your hands off me. Dont f---ing touch me.By the time Pena and Gow left, the police were on their way. Body-cam footage from that night shows a drunk, irate Pena arguing with police officers. Pena was charged with two counts of assault, having allegedly kicked not only the bouncer but also the bar owner, both in the crotch. Although she doesnt deny that her kick landed in the bouncers groin, she said in our interview it was never her intention to kick him there. She made no mention of the bar owner.Aside from wrong place, wrong time, Pena believes Dec. 20 was a lesson on the effects of fame, even fifth-ranked fame.People are going to want to mess with you and buy you drinks and say, I partied with this girl or that girl, and try to be getting their Snapchats and selfies, she says. I think thats part of the gig, and thats something that I didnt quite realize was as intense until that night. I realized I cant go out in my hometown alone anymore.Of course, there was her mothers salient notion about what happens after midnight ...In March, Pena was granted a stipulation order of continuance, which basically means that if she keeps her nose clean and goes to counseling for a year, the charges will be dismissed. The UFC, which had opened its own investigation into the matter, decided to let Pena continue her career in the promotion unobstructed.Which brings us to now -- or rather, to Saturday, the only thing on Penas mind. When she talks about fight time, her voice becomes steely, the emotions of the previous 40 minutes tightly controlled now. The legal kerfuffle, the injury, thats all in the past. I dont think about anything other than, my job is to be a gladiator, she says. Its time to kill or be killed and either youre going to do it or not. Thats my only concern.Shell have a time of it as well. Zingano may be coming off a long break between fights and a devastating loss to Rousey before that. But as Coach Little is quick to point out, Penas opponent has beaten both of Saturdays title-fight contenders before. That ups the stakes for Pena and could lead to major recognition by the promotion should she dominate. The two best girls in the world are fighting on Saturday, Little said, and its not the title fight.Up against possibly the toughest opponent of her career, with family, friends and certainly all of Spokane watching, what does the fifth-ranked female bantamweight have to prove? Everything, but mostly, shell be damned if any of these bitches think that theyre harder than me. Not on the inside, and not on the outside.Forty-five minutes into a conversation with Julianna Pena, and you need to hang up because the phone has turned white-hot. Cheap Yeezy China .5 million, one-year contract on Friday. Hawkins, who turns 41 in December, will compete with Rex Brothers for the closers role at spring training. Fake Yeezy China .Y. -- Knicks coach Mike Woodson said Wednesday that J. https://www.yeezychina.us/ . The recently retired Stern was elected Friday to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and will be enshrined with the class of 2014 on Aug. Wholesale Yeezy Shop . The 25-year-old Japanese star has officially been posted by his club team, the Rakuten Golden Eagles. Cheap Yeezy Free Shipping . Kyle Denbrook, a soccer player from Saint Marys University, took the CIS male athlete of the week honour. Stanley, a fourth-year business administration student from Charlottetown, scored both goals in a 2-0 win over Dalhousie on Friday and tallied again in a 1-0 win over Saint Marys on Sunday. WASHINGTON -- For the first time since his knee surgery in May, John Wall played in back-to-back games, and the result was a rare win for the Washington Wizards.Wall scored 23 points and had 11 assists and Otto Porter added 21 points as the Wizards won for just the third time in 11 games, beating the New York Knicks 119-112 on Thursday night.Wall sat out games in the first two Washington back-to-backs this season, and the Wizards lost both times.After Wednesday nights disheartening loss to the 76ers where Wall played 24 minutes, Washington coach Scott Brooks felt his star guard was ready to go again.There was going to be a time during the season where he was going to have to play back-to-back, Brooks said. The way he was progressing during the last four or five weeks, we felt that it was a good time.Brooks didnt want to play Wall more than 32 minutes, and when the Wizards opened up a 27-point lead late in the third quarter, it looked as if Wall could play much less than that.But New York scored 47 points in the fourth quarter, and Brooks put Wall back in the game in the final minutes.Once the Knicks went on a 12-0 run to cut the lead to 108-98 with 2:37 to play, Wall secured the win with two late baskets and four free throws.New York was led by Derrick Rose with 27. Carmelo Anthony scored 19, and Kristaps Porzingis, who had a career-high 35 against Detroit on Wednesday night, was held to 16. Brandon Jennings had 15 of his season-high 17 points in the fourth quarter.WHAT WALL BRINGSBrooks liked much about Walls game.He had a major impact in the first half, and I think he only had two points, Brooks said. There are a few pllayers in the league that can impact a game with passing and defense, and hes one of them.ddddddddddddWall had been eager to test himself, and was confident he passed the test.I dont like to miss games. I felt like I could have played earlier, but it was just part of what the doctors plan was, Wall said.LACK OF EFFORTDespite the late fourth quarter charge, Rose didnt necessarily like what he saw from his teammates.Tonight was effort, Rose said. When we see someone down or we see someone where things are not clicking, thats when weve got to come together as a team. So its still early in the year. Weve still got a lot more games to play. It just takes time.DEFENSE LACKINGNew York allowed a season high in points and Washington shot 54.3 percent.Some of that is guys are wide open. Theres a few of them that were contested, but we looked like we were a little tired from last night and we werent getting all the way up on the guys. And to win on the road, youve got to play good defense, coach Jeff Hornacek said.TIP-INSKnicks: F Lance Thomas missed his third straight game with a sore left ankle. ... C Joakim Noah was assessed a technical foul midway through the third quarter. . Have lost 10 of last 11 to Washington.Wizards: Made a season-high 15 3-pointers. . G Bradley Beal returned after missing three games with a right hamstring injury and had 18 points.UP NEXTKnicks: Host Atlanta on Sunday. The Hawks have won six straight.Wizards: Host Miami on Saturday. Its the second of three consecutive home games. ' ' '