Anderson Silva emotional after hard-fought win over Derek Brunson at UFC 208

BROOKLYN — Following the toughest stretch of his professional fight career, Anderson Silva returned to the win column at UFC 208 with a unanimous decision victory over Derek Brunson.

It was hard to imagine that Silva had gone winless for nearly five years as he stepped into the Octagon on Saturday night but those are exactly the odds he faced while taking on the No. 8 ranked middleweight in the world.

Silva and Brunson were very cautious in the early going with both fighters pawing at a distance just waiting for the other to launch an attack.

Finally, Silva went after Brunson with a flurry of punches, but failed to connect on anything flush. In response, Brunson decided to look for the takedown, but Silva did a good job of shrugging off his attempt as he kept the fight standing.

Silva went on the attack again late in the round before grabbing onto his patented Muay Thai clinch, which Brunson countered with a series of hard punches on the inside before they broke apart.

With seconds ticking away in the first round, Silva went for a late flying knee, but missed and it led to Brunson taking him down for a brief moment until the horn sounded.

Silva continued to stalk Brunson around the cage in the second round but when he finally unleashed a spinning back fist followed by a spinning kick, it resulted in a takedown against the cage.

Unfortunately for Brunson, he couldn't maintain the position with Silva doing a good job of working his way back up to the feet a few seconds later.

It was clear as the round moved forward that Silva's confidence was growing as he started to dance and move with his signature style before snapping Brunson's head back with a stiff jab. Still, it was tough to score the round with a lack of overall offense from either fighter.

Brunson got more aggressive in the final round as he pursued the takedown but Silva's wrestling defense was on point to counter virtually every attempt. Still, Brunson was dogged in his desire to get the fight to the ground and finally with less than two minutes to go he took Silva down to the mat.

The Brooklyn crowd got a little restless with Brunson content with staying in control on the ground as Silva was stuck on the bottom with no real attempt to get up again. As the fight came to an end it was clearly going to be a close decision with neither Silva nor Brunson truly hurting the other over three rounds.

In the end, the judges scored the fight in favor of Silva 29-28, 29-28, 30-27 -- handing Brunson his second loss in a row.

After being announced as the victor, an emotional Silva put his head down, overcome with the weight of the moment as he celebrated the win in front of a raucous crowd at the Barclays Center.

"When I come here, when I come inside this cage, I put my life to stay inside the cage. I respect everybody here," Silva said. "Now I just to fight happy because I love my job, I love the UFC, I love my fans."