Shakur Stevenson produced a long-awaited masterclass at the elite level on Saturday, dethroning Teofimo Lopez with a near-flawless performance in New York City.
Inside the iconic Madison Square Garden, it was New Jersey’s Stevenson versus Brooklyn’s Lopez, with the latter defending the WBO super-lightweight title. And the controversial Lopez, 28, was shown up by the smaller man in Stevenson, also 28, who won 11 out of 12 rounds on all three judges’ scorecards.
In doing so, Stevenson became a four-weight world champion in record time, adding to his past successes at lower weights. He also stayed unbeaten while handing Lopez his second professional loss. But for all of Stevenson’s achievements, the southpaw has blown hot and cold on fight nights, so Saturday’s victory may go down as a long-awaited, career-defining triumph for him.
Despite being the naturally-smaller man, Stevenson appeared stronger in the clinches, yet those were relatively few and far between, with Lopez generally struggling to close range on the challenger.
Lopez himself is a mercurial talent, and he looked far from his bewitching best here, missing wildly at times and walking onto Stevenson’s jab and cross at others. Lopez was also left bloodied courtesy of a cut around his left eye.
“I felt good, I picked him apart, I did what I was supposed to do,” Stevenson said in the ring after his win. “Hey, listen, I said I boxed guys like this my entire career. This is the art of boxing: hit and don’t get hit.
“I told y’all I’m the best fighter on the planet, and I stand by that. I watched [tape on] him and I knew my jab was gonna kill him. I told everyone: they’re gonna see I’ve got the best jab in boxing after this fight.
“I felt like I was the stronger fighter, I was faster, I was sharper, I was smarter, [but] he’s one of the best fighters I’ve been in there with.”
Stevenson added: “We’re gonna go back to the drawing board, but hold up, there’s a fighter here tonight and he motivated me. Where’s he at? Conor Benn!”
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The British welterweight entered the ring to say: “You’re too small for me, bro, you’re tiny. You can’t punch, you can’t keep me off you.”
“My skills is too much!” Stevenson countered, before telling Eddie Hearn, who promotes both fighters: “He’s food! He’s food! He’s food!”
“You think I’m scared of you? I’m not scared of you, bro,” Benn went on. “We can do it next. Come up to welterweight with the big dogs. You’re a little man.”
However, Benn signed off by admitting it’s “your night” to Stevenson and backing off.
