By Jim Dower: In one of WBA/WBC super middleweight champion Andre Ward’s easier victories of his career, he destroyed 30-year-old Chad Dawson (31-2, 17 KO’s) in a 10th round stoppage on Saturday night after Dawson quit following the 3rd knockdown of the fight at the Oracle Arena in Oakland, California. Dawson went down in the 3rd, 4th and 10th rounds from hard left hooks by Ward.

The fight was halted at 2:45 of the 10th round with Dawson having been knocked down.

It’s hard to say what happened to Dawson tonight, because he’s considered to the best fighter in the light heavyweight division. However, in moving down in weight it could be that Dawson sacrificed some badly needed muscle that both drained of his strength as well his legs. Dawson looked weak in the legs from the 3rd round, and was getting knocked down left and right by Ward’s powerful left hook.

Dawson hit the deck in the 3rd round from a hard left hook by Ward. At the time it looked like more of a flash knockdown in which Dawson wasn’t ready for the shot because he was relaxed at the time Ward drilled him. However, Ward showed in the next round, the 4th, that it wasn’t a fluke as he put Dawson down again with a left hook. From there, Ward’s confidence soured while Dawson’s plummeted.

Ward showed zero respect as he drilled the confused looking and completely lost Dawson with punch after punch both on the inside and the outside. I figured that Ward would dominate in close because he was clearly the better inside fighter going into the fight. However, I wasn’t prepared to see Ward also dominating on the outside and making Dawson look inept.

From the 4th round on, it was just a sickeningly one-sided fight with Dawson getting totally dominated by Ward. In the end it was probably a relief to Dawson that the fight was finally over because he was going to take a real beating in the 11th and 12th rounds had it continued.

Other fights on the card:

Antonio DeMarco TKO 1 John Molina
Franklin Lawrence TKO 7 Homero Fonseca
Ricardo Williams UD 6 Anthony Lenk