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    Mark Palmer •

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    Pat Miletich: Matt Hughes out of coma

    Matt Hughes, former UFC middleweight champ and wrestling All-American who was seriously injured in a truck-train collision in June, continues to make progress and is no longer in a coma, said fellow UFC Hall of Fame member -- and good friend -- Pat Miletich.

    Matt Hughes
    "He is surprising the doctors," Miletich said in an interview Monday. "He's making great leaps and he's no longer in a coma, and he's improving. It's going to be a long road. Any type of head trauma at that level, there's going to be some rehab."

    Miletich said he hasn't been able to visit Hughes, who has been hospitalized in Springfield, Ill., since the accident on June 16.

    "Nobody is allowed to visit him besides family," Miletich said. "That's it right now. They don't want to overload him, they want his energy to go to healing and not to anything else."

    There have been no updates on the Facebook page of family member Beth Hughes Ulrici since early July, who at the time reported that Matt Hughes had been removed from a ventilator and was showing "small signs of improvement."

    Miletich and Hughes share a long friendship ... and impressive wrestling and MMA backgrounds.

    Miletich, who wrestled at Bettendorf High School and at a community college in Iowa, was the UFC's first 170-pound champion who shared his knowledge with fellow Midwesterner Hughes, who later became what many consider to be one of the greatest 170-pound fighters of all time. Prior to entering MMA, Hughes was a two-time Illinois high school state wrestling champ who went on to become a two-time NCAA Division I All-American at Eastern Illinois University.
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