By Dan Ambrose: WBC light heavyweight champion Adonis Stevenson (27-1, 22 KOs) made easy work of #9 WBC Tommy Karpency (25-5-1, 14 KOs) in stopping him in the 3rd round to retain his WBC title on Premier Boxing Champions on Spike at the Ricoh Coliseum, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Stevenson, 37, knocked Karpency down with a big left hand to the head at the end of the 2nd round.
Karpency was able to get up and make it out of the round just barely. At the start of the 3rd, Stevenson knocked Karpency down with another left to the head. The referee stopped the fight after Karpency got back to his feet after determining he was too hurt to continue fighting.
Karpency was doing well in the first two rounds until he was hurt by a jarring left to the head late in the 2nd round. That shot just took all the energy out of Karpency. I don’t think he ever recovered from it. He was clearly still hurt when he came out for the 3rd round.
After the fight, Stevenson said “Kovalev, you’re easy work. It’s time to unify the titles. I want to win the unification titles.”
It’s going to be difficult for Stevenson to get a fight against IBF/WBA/WBO light heavyweight champion Sergey Kovalev unless Stevenson is willing to fight on HBO. That’s the network that Kovalev fights on, as he’s got a contract with them. If Stevenson is willing to fight on HBO, which is unlikely, then they can fight each other.
Undefeated junior middleweight prospect Prichard Colon (16-0, 13 KOs) stayed unbeaten with a 4th round knockout win on Friday night over 37-year-old former WBA light welterweight champion Vivian Harris (32-11-2, 19 KOs).
The hard hitting Colon landed a four-punch combination to put Harris on the canvas in the 4th. Harris was much too hurt to get up and the fight was then halted.
“It was good putting his name on my resume,” the 22-year-old Colon said after the fight.
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Unbeaten #8 WBA welterweight contender Errol Spence (18-0, 15 KOs) put on an impressive punching display to destroy #7 IBF Chris Van Heerden (23-2-1, 12 KOs) by an eight round knockout. Spence knocked Van Heerden down twice in the 7th round. Van Heerden was able to make it out of the round just barely.
In the 8th, Spence hurt the 28-year-old Van Heerden with a flurry of shots that caused him to back up to the ropes. Spence then unloaded a series of huge power shots to the head and body that resulted in referee Allan Huggins stepping to halt the fight at 0:52 of the round.
Spence really worked Van Heerden over in the 7th round in dropping him twice. The first knockdown came from a chopping left hand to the head by Spence. In the second knockdown, Spence knocked Van Heerden down with a big left to the body. Van Heerden stayed down until the count of 8.
Van Heerden’s left eye was badly swollen by the 8th and was almost closed. Spence had Van Heerden’s left eye starting to swell from the 1st round from the hard jabs that he was nailing him with.
Van Heerden had a point deducted in the 4th round for having his mouthpiece knocked out. The referee thought that he had spit it out, but it was clearly knocked out by a big looping left hand to the head. In the previous round, Van Heerden had lost his mouthpiece as well after getting hit.
“I want anyone in the top 10,” Spence said after the fight. “I want to fight the best. I wanted a spectacular performance. I want the big fights. I took my time and broke him down,” Spence said.
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