Maycee Barber’s rocket rise towards a UFC title shot took an unfortunate detour in January of 2020, when she was injured and suffered her first professional loss in a bout against Roxanne Modafferi.

More than a year later, the 22-year-old returns to face Alexa Grasso at UFC 258 on Saturday night in Las Vegas.

How a fighter responds to their first defeat in the Octagon can go a long way to determining the type of career they’ll have going forward and, in Barber’s case, she’s happy with the way she continued in the fight, even after suffering a torn ACL in the opening round.

"I was upset a little bit for a little while, but like I said, I was 100 per cent prepared, I was confident in myself winning the fight,” Barber told TSN. “Freak injury happened and I tore my leg. I don’t view that as a loss because as soon as I tore my leg it was not like, oh I’m out of this fight, I quit, none of that ever crosses my mind. I am in there 100 per cent and I’m going to go after a finish no matter what. But a fight’s a fight and I tore my leg and I went the distance on a torn leg so, I was still happy with my performance.”

The Colorado native admits that what bothered her the most was knowing she was going to be on the shelf and not able to get back in the Octagon to get that winning feeling back.

"The thing that was frustrating was, even though I did suffer the loss, I wanted to be able to go back and take that fight and fight it back right away,” said Barber. “But knowing I was going to have to be out for a whole year and not be able to fix a loss or go out and have another win or perform or even go in the gym and train, that was kind of a daunting thing to me and that’s what I kind of had to overcome.”

Now, 13 months later, Barber is a betting underdog heading into her return and with all the time she’s had to prepare, she says, put the cash on her.

"I’ve been training ever since I got cleared, I’ve essentially had a really long fight camp and my knee is 100 per cent,” said Barber. “I feel amazing, it’s been one of the best camps of my life, I’ve got the best coaches in the world with me and I don’t feel like an underdog. At the same time, if you want to put me as an underdog, a lot of people are going to make a lot of money off of me when I win.”

One change that Barber has made ahead of her return is doing her training in Chicago rather than in Milwaukee, where she’s had previous camps. Barber says the change has to to with training under the right people and with the right teammates.

"This fight coming back is the biggest fight of my life and I wanted to be 100 per cent prepared and I felt like the training partners that I had at Roufusport, they were good training partners, but I needed great training partners,” said Barber. “I needed females, I needed people to grind with, I needed the coaching. I wanted to get more wrestling, I wanted to get better striking, so I decided to go with Mike Valle from Valle Flow Striking and I’ve had a long time relationship with Izzy Martinez, I met him when I was 15 or 16 down in Albuquerque. I know that those guys are going to have me prepared and I have great training partners.”

Barber’s stated goal is to be the youngest champion in UFC history and she always has her eye on that prize. In order to move up the rankings, she already knows who she wants next after her return fight on Saturday.

"I’d like to fight Joanne Calderwood, because I feel like she’s the next spot up and then it’s the next tier, because she was getting ready for the title contention and she was ready for that fight,” said Barber. “She’s kinda in between there and that’s a win I know I can get. That’s a win that I think would put me in the spot for the title fight.”