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A star was born in the bubble Saturday night when Teofimo López fulfilled his enormous promise with a surprisingly complete victory over Vasiliy Lomachenko, the two-time Olympic gold medalist and three-weight champion from Ukraine widely regarded as boxing’s pound-for-pound champion. . best.
The 23-year-old Brooklyn native dominated the first half of the long-awaited lightweight title unification fight at the MGM Grand Conference Center, then contained a late surge and showed the final kick of a champion to unify the IBF, the WBA. and WBO title belts at 135 pounds. All three judges in the ring favored Lopez with scores of 119-109, 117-111 and 116-112. (The Guardian had it 116-112).
Lopez, who captured the IBF version of the lightweight championship with a poignant knockout of Richard Commey in December and walked away as a 3-1 underdog on Saturday, came out of surprise not with his formidable power but by technically surpassing the fighter. most competent of the sport – a result predicted by practically no one.
“Many people spoke highly of him and I expected more,” Lopez said. “Basic. Honestly, it was pretty basic. Maybe it was the 14 month layoff that did it, I don’t know. But they laid me off 10 months, so why does it matter? I fought the guy everyone says is the best pound per pound “.
Lopez took advantage of a slow start from Lomachenko, a former junior lightweight and featherweight world champion whose only glimpses of vulnerability have come since moving up to lightweight. The 32-year-old southpaw spent the first four rounds throwing punches sparingly, content to sit back and measure the task before him. Lopez was able to easily make rounds by tapping his opponent with a constant diet of punches and rights to the head and body.
As the fight progressed into the middle rounds, Lomachenko kept waiting for an error that never came and was forced to alter his tactics as his face began to swell from Lopez’s accumulation of punches. After a warning from referee Russell Mora for leading with the head, Lomachenko came to life midway through the eighth and landed a three-punch combination followed by a clean forehand. He landed 19 of 38 in the round after landing just 31 in the first seven combined, but the fight was finally on.
Feeling that Lopez couldn’t take the pressure, Lomachenko picked up where he had left off in the ninth and continued to release his hands. He staggered Lopez with a combination early in the round, but the younger champion held his ground and struck back with an uppercut through Lomachenko’s guard. By the 11th, Lomachenko was turning to punishment and the momentum had clearly swung in his favor, although he had waited too long to flip the switch.
Knowing that Lomachenko probably needed a knockout to win going into 12, Lopez’s father and coach urged their son to box from range. But Lopez ignored the advice and took a bite in the final round in a clear effort to go for the knockout. He hit and bloodied Lomachenko with right hands and uppercuts for the final three minutes. The referee appeared to save Lomachenko time by allowing time for action after an accidental header in the final seconds caused a major injury to Lopez’s right eye, but by then the result was almost a handshake.
“I’m a fighter,” Lopez said when asked why he ignored his father’s advice. “I have to dig deep. I knew it would come. I didn’t know if they had it on the scorecards or not, and I love fighting. I can hit too. I don’t care, man. I’ll take one to give one. That is what a true champion does. I find a way to win. “
Lomachenko landed 141 of 321 punches compared to Lopez’s 183 of 659, according to Compubox hitting statistics.
“I think in the first half of the fight, he got more rounds than I did,” Lomachenko said through a translator. “But then in the second half of the fight, I took over and was much better. I want to go home and review the fight to see. I can’t comment much on that right now. But I definitely don’t agree with the scorecards. “
He added: “At the moment I think (I won the fight). But the result is the result. I’m not going to argue now. “
Lopez then claimed it as a victory for the younger generation of fighters who are eager to break through, putting himself at the head of a promising class that includes Shakur Stevenson, Jaron ‘Boots’ Ennis and David Benavidez.
“This is the new generation,” he said. “We are recovering what was the old school. Fight against the best and keep going. I’m not here to choose who I want to fight because I want to defend my title and keep that ‘O’. No. And now who knows how my numbers will go up after this.
“Everyone wants to be like Mayweather. To be like Mayweather, you must first be like Pretty Boy. You’re going to fight those guys where people don’t think you’ll win. You have to fight guys like that who are undefeated and it’s a good fight to make those kinds of millions that people want to win. “
