LOS ANGELES: Bermane Stiverne claimed the vacant World Boxing Council heavyweight title, stopping Chris Arreola yesterday to become the first fighter in years not named Klitschko to grab a share of the heavyweight crown.
The 35-year-old Canadian Stiverne knocked Arreola down twice in the sixth round before referee Jack Reiss stopped the bout at 2:02 of the round, giving Stiverne the victory in the first heavyweight championship bout on American soil since 2009.
“I had a dream to be the world champion,” Stiverne said. “For me it was an impossible dream but I just kept going. I didn’t stop.”
Stiverne connected with a right cross to the temple that sent Arreola to the canvas for the first time early in the sixth in front of a crowd of 3,992 at the University of South California’s Galen Center arena.
Arreola’s knees buckled and he stumbled several feet across the ring before going down.
Later in the round Stiverne knocked the American halfway through the ropes with a left and then finished him off with a barrage of lefts and rights in Arreola’s corner.
“I came here on a mission,” said Stiverne, who was born in Haiti and lived there until age seven when he emigrated to Montreal. “I didn’t come here to lose. Nobody was going to beat me.”
Heavyweight title fights in North America have been rare in recent times because of a lack of serious challengers to the Klitschko brothers, Vitali and Wladimir. Stiverne captured the WBC title that Vitali Klitschko surrendered so he could concentrate on politics in his native Ukraine.
It was the second straight win for Stiverne over Arreola as he put on an impressive performance in a rematch of their April 2013 fight.
“I didn’t see that punch coming,” Arreola said of Saturday’s first knockdown. “His power is in his hand speed. It is like a bulldozer. “That’s boxing. All it takes is one punch to knock someone out. He hit me with that right hand, put my ass down and I couldn’t recover.” Stiverne said he was waiting for opportunity to use that right cross again after an exchange on the ropes.AFP
