After a brief glimpse at the house in which Sevak asks fellow Armenian Sako (“Psycho”) to avenge his loss to Jonathan Brookins, we go to the gym, where Georges St. Pierre tells his team they’re scaling back training. No hard-core sparring. No exhaustion. He wants to work on their tactics and keep them fresh and hungry for their fights. Like most of GSP’s training ideas, it makes perfect sense, especially when the typical Ultimate Fighter contestant gasses in the first round in the midst of such an intense schedule.

Koscheck trains Psycho to avoid giving up his back and getting caught in a rear naked choke. Easier said than done — the choke is usually the end result of being beaten up.

Back at the house — specifically in the yard — Brookins chats with Nam Phan, crossing team lines to talk about how humble they are compared to all the cocky dudes in the house at the pool table.

We go quickly to the fight after the first commercial break. Herb Dean is our ref. They touch gloves, and we’re off.

Brookins stands southpaw, jabs a few times and shoots for the takedown. Psycho fights it off but remains clinched. Brookins somehow throws the judo master and ends up, you guessed it, on Psycho’s back. Psycho keeps Brookins’ hands tied up, but Brookins wraps him up with his legs. It’s a matter of time. The tap comes 2:06 into the first round, and Psycho punches the cage.

Into the locker rooms: Psycho berates himself for not following the game plan, saying he should’ve backed up and kept throwing his hands. In the GSP locker room, Brookins looks like he had a good day at the skate park.

Next up: GSP’s Cody McKenzie against Koscheck’s best hope, the experienced Nam Phan.

McKenzie, lest we forget, has won all but one fight by guillotine. His teammates tease him that in his other win, he knocked the guy out … while he was in a guillotine.

But GSP isn’t confident. He says Nam has better jiu-jitsu and striking than Cody, so the idea is to put Nam on his back.

Another McKenzie reminder: He has been trash-talking Koscheck throughout the season. This makes Koscheck mad, and he jokes that Nam needs to beat him up or walk out of the Octagon through the gate farthest from Kos. At least, we *think* Koscheck’s joking.

Back at the house: Cody finds it odd that Nam is talking so much with him, asking him how most of his fights go. Yet Cody doesn’t make an effort to leave the kitchen. He jokes with Nam that people always say his wins are flukes. Cody, picture on the lawn reading a Bible, tells the camera people don’t take him seriously because he’s a long-haired Alaskan who drinks a little more than most.

Nam, a cerebral veteran, is concerned because Cody’s techniques “are not conventional, but they work.”

As in his first fight, Cody lets Nam know up front that he’s not touching gloves. The guys respect each other, so we’ll have to guess he’s planning to storm across the cage as he did in his previous win.

Josh Rosenthal is our ref, and yes, Cody goes quickly across the cage and gets Nam against the fence. Koscheck reminds Nam “we drilled this.” Nam defends it, but Cody lands a few good knees and body punches. Cody drops for the takedown, Nam tries to work his arm, and then Cody gets it.

Two minutes into the fight, Nam finally gets away from the fence, curiously passing up some guillotine opportunities of his own. Nam swings wildly, and Cody drives him back against the fence. Cody lands good uppercuts while Nam’s corner yells that he’s losing the fight.

Nam finally frees himself and initally has trouble with Cody’s height and reach advantage. He lands a couple of rights to stagger Cody — probably too late to win the round but enough to get some momentum.

Cody does not race across the cage for the second round, and Nam starts finding the range with his head kicks against the taller Cody. We go to the fence again with Cody in control, but Nam fights his way out. They trade again, clinch again, trade again, clinch again. Nam looks sharper in the stand-up and rocks Cody with a left, then a right.

It’s a body shot, though, that takes out Cody. A good powerful left hand, and Cody immediately winces and falls. Nam rushes in to follow up on the ground, but Rosenthal quickly determines that Cody’s in no position to defend himself. It’s over.

Koscheck celebrates a rare win, to the extent that GSP tells the camera Kos was “not very sportsmanship.”

Can’t decide — does Cody look like a thinner Edwin McCain? Maybe Scott Stapp?

Anyway — Koscheck gets at least one fighter in the semifinals. That might be it. Next week, Aaron Wilkinson will be an underdog against Kyle Watson, and we have the all-GSP matchup of feuding teammates Michael Johnson and Alex Caceres.

Or is it? Caceres seems a little comfortable in Koscheck yellow in the previews.

Something seemed missing in this episode. Ohhh right … no “male nurse”/medic fighting Koscheck.