By Jason Kim: In something of an upset, the hard hitting featherweight contender Antonio Escalante (20-2, 13 KOs) stopped Gary Stark Jr. (22-3, 8 KOs) in the 3rd round on Friday night at the UIC Pavilion, in Chicago, Illinois. Escalante, 23, hurt Stark with a big left hook in the 3rd round, knocking him to the canvas. Stark got up but was almost immediately mowed down with a left and then a chopping right hand while standing against the ropes.
Stark, 29, attempted to get up to try and beat the count, but staggered and fell back down on the canvas. Referee Gerald Scott officially stopped the bout at 1:31 of the 3rd.
Stark looked good in the opening round, throwing blazing fast combinations, and jabbing over and over again. Escalante stalked him around the ring, and would land heavy shots whenever he could catch up to him. Although both fighters were roughly about the same size in height at 5’5”, Escalante looked huge compared to Stark and at least 10 to 15 pounds heavier in weight.
He wasn’t just bigger, Escalante had much more power in both hands and it seemed even in the first minute of the round that sooner or later, Escalante would catch up to Stark and blast him out of there. Stark stayed on the move for the first minute. However, Escalante came on in the 2nd minute of the round and landed one huge left hook to the body and several big right hands to the head.
Stark was able to salvage the round in the last minute by landing some fast right hands that caught Escalante while he was trying to come inside to punch. The round was close, but it looked as if Stark had won it due to his early start in the round. By the end of the round, Stark had swelling under his left eye.
Escalante started well in the 2nd round, ripping into Stark with some powerful body shots. Stark continued firing back with fast combinations, but Escalante’s heavy shots seemed to make his punches appear insignificant in comparison. Stark continued moving around to avoid being an easy target for Escalante’s big punches. Escalante caught Stark up against the ropes on several occasions and was Able to land some tremendous shots.
Stark landed a short flurry in the last seconds of the round in an effort to try and impress the judges. However, Escalante looked to be the better fighter in the round and appeared to do the much better work. The swelling under Stark’s left eye was getting worse, growing redder by the end of the round.
Stark seemed to get a little over confident in the 3rd after landing some nice left-right combinations to the head of Escalante. Instead of getting in his shots and moving away immediately like he had done through the first two rounds, Stark stood around and seemed to be admiring his work.
Escalante finally caught him with a big sweeping left hook in the corner that put Stark down. He got up and was clearly hurt. It would take a minor miracle at this point for him to try and escape the round. I expected him to try and clinch to buy some time. However, instead Stark moved along the ropes and then stopped to cover up.
Escalante then moved in and landed a left-right combination that put Stark down for good. The finishing punch was a chopping right hand that crashed on the side of Stark’s jaw, sending him down. Stark then tried to get up, but staggered and fell back down on the canvas.
“I was expecting a little more from Gary Stark,” Escalante said after the fight. “The first round was kind of awkward because he started boxing me. I noticed that my left was going in. I said it before – if I can get you, I will knock you out. I realized that when we sparred a couple of years ago, he [Stark] couldn’t take the pressure.“