Sergey Kovalev Blasts Through Shabranskyy in NYC

Sergey Kovalev Blasts Through Shabranskyy in NYC – The WBO world light heavyweight title was at play last night on HBO as Sergey Kovalev took on Vyachelsav Shabranskyy at the Madison Square Garden Theater in NY.

Kovalev entered the fight with some open questions after two straight losses to Andre Ward and he answered those questions right away. Kovalev scored two knock downs in the opening round, with the second one being much more definitive. Shabranskyy did well to survive and answer the bell for round two and he would come out fighting. Shabranskyy hit the canvas again in the round and Kovalev appeared to smell blood. He closed throwing punches and the referee stepped in to save the hapless Shabranskyy. Kovalev regains the WBO world light heavyweight title with a second round stoppage.

Light heavyweights Sullivan Barrera and Felix Valera met in the evening’s co-feature bout. Valera was a bit of an unknown but he got people’s attention early when he sent Barrera to the canvas hard. By the end of the round Barrera had been credited with a knockdown of his own. In round two Barrera  was bleeding and he had to work his boxing skills to corral the wild card in Valera. No one thought the fight would go the distance as Valera had three points deducted for low blows and was throwing punches with very bad intentions, but both men saw the final bell. At bouncy castle water slide the end, the judges had the fight for Barrera, who is now the mandatory challenger for IBF world light heavyweight champion Dmitry Bivol, who was in attendance.

The HBO broadcast got kicked off with super featherweight action as Jason Sosa clashed with Yuriorkis Gamboa. Sosa was looking to bounce back from a loss to Vasyl Lomachenko against Gamboa, a late replacement. Gamboa showed flashes of his talent throughout the fight, however he never seemed to hurt Sosa or slow him down. Gamboa went down in the eighth round and in the final round he had a point deducted for holding but he and his corner were confident they had done enough as the bout went to the judges. Team Gamboa would prove to be right as the judges returned a majority decision in his favor. A hard fought fight that could have gone either way.

Check back later for more coverage from TSS, we had writers live at the MSG Theater.

Saturday, November 25th, 2017 – Madison Square Garden Theater, NY, NY

175 LBS 12 RDS: Sergey Kovalev def Vyacheslav Shabranskyy via TKO in RD 2 @2:36.
175 LBS 10 RDS: Sullivan Barrera def Felix Valera via UD (98-88,97-90,97-89)
130 LBS 10 RDS: Yuriorkis Gamboa def Jason Sosa via MD (94-94,95-93,96-92)
154 LBS 10 RDS: Bakhram Murtazaliev def Carlos Galvan via TKO in RD5 @1:35.

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