STATE COLLEGE, Pa. – Let’s get one thing clear: Ed Ruth wants to punch someone in the face. Anyone. After all, that’s way easier than wrestling.

As it happens, on Friday at Bellator 186, the person Ruth (3-0 MMA, 3-0 BMMA) wants to punch in the face is UFC veteran Chris Dempsey (11-5 MMA, 0-0 BMMA), who is making his promotional debut against the former Penn State University wrestling standout, now an unbeaten and up-and-coming middleweight.

Bellator 186 takes place at Bryce Jordan Center on Penn State’s campus in University Park, Pa. The main card, including Ruth vs. Dempsey, airs on Spike following prelims on MMAjunkie.

In his young MMA career, Ruth has three knockouts in three fights. For his fourth fight in his first year as a pro, he wants to keep that perfect finishing rate.

“I’m looking for the fourth knockout,” Ruth told MMAjunkie on Wednesday. “Obviously I want to go for submissions and everything (eventually). But once you first step in the cage, and you’re a young fighter, the first thing on your mind is you just want to punch somebody. You just want to hit ’em. It’s a new feeling – it’s brand new.

“(When) I was wrestling, I could just grapple you. I could just grab your leg and take you down. Now I can just punch you. That’s easy. Once you get past that initial fear of punching someone in the face, it’s great. It takes a lot of stress out of your body.”

Dempsey comes into the fight as the most accomplished MMA opponent Ruth will have been in the cage against. But he’s fallen on some hard times. After a 10-1 start to his career, he got the call from the UFC. But there, he went just 1-3, and his lone win was a questionable split decision over Eddie Gordon.

Dempsey’s three UFC losses all were knockouts, and after he was let go, he suffered another KO loss in just 40 seconds to Adam Hunter in Pittsburgh in June. But Dempsey is a Pennsylvanian, too, and may be girded by a home-state fight, even though he’ll clearly be on Ruth’s turf at Penn State.

“I didn’t train just for Chris Dempsey – I’ve been training for anybody, anybody I’ll meet in the Bellator cage,” Ruth said. “I’ve seen him as a fighter. I just don’t believe he has anything I should be scared of. I don’t think he has anything that will stump me. But as I go out there, I’m still going to respect him like he’s a champion. I don’t want to go out there with my hands down, flat-footed, and get caught. That happens. I saw a couple of his fights in the past, (but) I didn’t see too much that made me put up the alert.”

For more from Ruth, check out the video above.

And for more on Bellator 186, check out the MMA Rumors section of the site.