IBF light heavyweight champion Bernard “the Alien” Hopkins, 55-6-1 (32), of Philadelphia, PA, easily defeated by split decision WBA champion Beibut Shumenov, of, 14-2 (9), out of Las Vegas, NV, over 12 rounds at the Armory in Washington, DC. Saturday night! This gives Hopkins the WBA Super World and IBF titles. “I want (Adonis) Stevenson (WBC Champ) in Canada before I’m 50,” said Hopkins.
Shumenov controlled the first 3 rounds with his jab. Hopkins didn’t get offense until the 3rd round. It was a chess match. It took Shumenov until near the end of the 4th to land his first combination. Hopkins landed some solid punches in taking his first round. In the 5th a lead right hand by Hopkins landed on the chin of Shumenov. At the end of the round Shumenov landed a straight right hand to the chin of Hopkins. Close round.
In the 6th Hopkins was landing more than Shumenov with combinations and jabs while Shumenov had swelling under his left eye. Hopkins evened the score after 6. Hopkins had his best round in the 7th countering Shumenov very well. Hopkins picked up the action in the 8th being a step quicker in landing his punches with few missing Shumenov ending with a left hook to the chin.
In the 9th Hopkins continued landing lead rights to the head of Shumenov ending the round once again this time with a lead right to the chin. In the 10th Hopkins continued to land more while Shumenov for the first time pinned Hopkins to the ropes in order to land some punches before Hopkins spun off and again controlled the action.
Almost halfway thru the round a crushing lead right to the chin dropped Shumenov to a knee. Just prior to the bell Shumenov landed a left hook to the head and Hopkins countered with a right to the chin. In the 12th and final round Hopkins controlled the action ending it in fine fashion. Shumenov works without a trainer while Hopkins has Naziim Richardson. Hopkins dominated from the 4th round on.
Earl Brown did a fine job as the referee with no fouls and few clinches by both fighters. Judge’s Dave Moretti 116-111 Hopkins and an outrageous 114-113 for Shumenov by Gustovo Padilla and 116-111 by Jerry Roth for the winner by split decision Bernard Hopkins. DHB had it 117-110 for Hopkins.
WBO middleweight champion Peter "Kid Chocolate" Quillin, 31-0 (22), Brooklyn, NY, easily defended his title defeating Lukas Konecny, 50-5 (23), of CZ, with a 12-round unanimous decision.
It was all Quillin with Konecny moving forward with hands high and little offense taking punch after punch from Quillan. Konecny opened up more in the 2nd landing a good right uppercut to the chin of Quillin. It wasn’t until the 3rd round that Konecny started landing combinations to the body. From the 4th thru the 8h Quillin continued landing left hook’s to the body and power punch rights to the head with one right stunned Konecny making him clinch.
In the 7th Konecny covering up took a lot of punches which continued the rest of the way. Scores all favored Quillin at 120-108 and119-109 twice.
