Shakur Stevenson was unable to defend the unified junior lightweight world title because he had been stripped Thursday for missing weight.
But that didn’t stop him from putting on a dominating performance against Robson Conceicao in the main event of Top Rank Boxing on ESPN’s undercard Friday night before a record crowd of 10,107 at the Prudential Center in Stevenson’s hometown of Newark, N.Y. Sweater.
SHAKUR IS HIM.@BudLight | @ShakurStevenson pic.twitter.com/v6vRoIgW4l
— Top Rank Boxing (@trboxing) September 24, 2022
Stevenson scored a knockdown in the fourth round and earned a one-sided decision, 118-108, 117-109, 117-109. Fight Freaks Unite had Stevenson win 119-107.
Because Stevenson weighed in at 131.6 pounds at the weigh-ins, he lost both the WBC and WBO 130-pound titles on the scale, thus becoming vacant. If Conceicao had won, he would have become champion, but he never seriously entered the fight, blocked again and again by Stevenson’s full game.
“I had a long week. I killed myself to gain weight,” Stevenson said. “All I wanted to do was come here and perform. I did everything I could to do that.”
Despite weight issues, he performed at a very high level. Stevenson, who plans to move up to lightweight, took control early on, outboxing and punching Conceicao, who could have opted out of fighting the overweight Stevenson and still get his $250,000 purse and be in line to fight someone else for a vacant title. .
But he went ahead with the fight, taking an undisclosed amount of money from Stevenson’s $3 million purse, and took a beating.
Stevenson (19-0, 9 KOs), 25, a southpaw, said he got a big boost from his hometown crowd. “He gave me a tremendous amount of energy,” Stevenson said. “I love Newark and I appreciate Newark.”
While Stevenson was diverse with his attack, using right hooks, straight left hands and a ton of body shots, Conceicao primarily sought to land his right hand, but was largely unsuccessful against Stevenson, who has supreme defense.
Stevenson also showed off his offense. He landed the first big punch from him in the third round when he hit Conceicao with a clean left hook. In the fourth round, Stevenson landed a solid right hook that stunned Conceicao. Later in the round, Stevenson landed a left hand to the body that dropped Conceicao on a late reaction with a second left in the round. By the seventh round, Stevenson was pummeling Conceicao, who had little more than his heart left. After the seventh round, the ringside doctor went to Conceicao’s corner to examine him and allowed the fight to continue. In fact, he had one of the best rounds of his in the eighth, but he still couldn’t do much. Most of all, he tried to hold Stevenson down to prevent further damage.
“I’m just a dominant individual. With me against him and the referee, I did everything I could to try and beat him as much as I could,” Stevenson said. “He held me all night, but I did my best. “I think he was holding me down a lot every time he came in. As soon as I got inside, he grabbed me. Other than that, he is very rare and very tough, so he knows how to survive.”
Stevenson unbalanced Conceicao with a hard right hand to the button in the opening seconds of the ninth round, but when he dropped him to the canvas later in the round, referee David Fields docked a point from Stevenson.
A left uppercut stopped Conceicao in his tracks in the opening seconds of the eleventh round, and by the end of the round, it looked like Stevenson was close to a stoppage as he landed a series of powerful left hands. Conceicao made it to the final bell, but after the fight medical staff administered an IV in his dressing room as a precaution.
“Shakur was amazing as always, and he was there tonight against a tough fighter like Robson Conceicao,” Top Rank promoter Bob Arum said. “There are so many great fights for Shakur at lightweight. The Newark crowd was spectacular, and we look forward to many more fight nights at this stadium.”
According to CompuBox stats, Stevenson landed 199 of 531 punches (38 percent) and Conceicao landed 60 of 483 (12 percent). Of Stevenson’s career-high 199 punches landed, 75 were body shots. Conceicao landed just five body shots.
Stevenson also outboxed him in every round except the first, in which Conceicao held a 4-3 lead. Conceicao landed punches in double figures only in the third round when he landed 10 punches. Conceicao (17-2, 8 KOs), 33, a three-time Brazilian Olympian and 2016 Olympic gold medalist, lost his second world title fight, though many viewed him as an uncrowned champion due to a controversial loss by decision to then-WBC champion Oscar Valdez last September, after which Valdez lost a lopsided decision to Stevenson in a unification fight on April 30.
With his performance, Stevenson said he felt he sent a message to the deep and talented lightweight division, which includes fighters such as undisputed champion Devin Haney, former champions George Kambosos Jr. and Vasiliy Lomachenko, and secondary champion Gervonta.” Tank”. Davis, among others. “Everyone at 135 has to understand it,” Stevenson said, adding that he would fight “anyone.”
Of course, I’d rather challenge Haney, who is also with Top Rank. However, he will face Kambosos in a rematch on October 15 and then, assuming Haney wins and Lomachenko wins a fight scheduled for October 29, they will likely meet in the first quarter of 2023.
So while a lightweight title shot is unlikely in the near future, that’s Stevenson’s goal.
“We have to fight the champion. Set it up. Devin and I can make sure,” said Stevenson, who is also a former featherweight champion. I will fight Lomachenko too.”
Davis dominates, stops Store
In the eight-round co-feature, lightweight prospect Keyshawn Davis dominated, knocked down and stopped Omar Tienda in the fifth round.
“Honestly, it felt like a dream come true. I couldn’t believe I got the opportunity to perform (on a card of this) magnitude again because I was out due to health issues,” said Davis, who hadn’t boxed since winning Stevenson’s last card in April due to illness. “I really didn’t know what to expect from myself, but I always said that since I turned pro, God has me. And he definitely had me tonight.”
Davis (6-0, 5 KOs), 23, of Norfolk, Virginia, who claimed a silver medal at the delayed 2020 Tokyo Olympics, repeatedly hurt Tienda with a right hand from the first round when it appeared drop one on him in the final moments of the round, but referee Earl Brown ruled it a slip.
Now being trained by Brian McIntyre and camped by Terence Crawford, Davis was in control throughout the fight and a seemingly frustrated Tienda, who landed almost nothing of note, dropped him to the canvas in the fourth round and received a stern warning for the infringement. of brown.
In the fifth round, Davis caught Tienda with another fighting hand and dropped him to all fours. Tienda beat the count, but Davis lunged at him in a follow-up attack, hitting him with about 10 unanswered punches and knocking his head back, forcing Brown to stop the fight at 1 minute, 38 seconds.
“We’re working to become a contender,” Davis said. “My next fight will put me through that process quicker. Then next year we will definitely be contenders, and we will be in the top 10 for sure.”
Tienda (25-6, 18 KOs), 34, of Mexico, rode a seven-fight winning streak and suffered his second knockout loss and first since 2013.
