Prudential Center—-Shakur Stevenson moved up to fight Shuichiro Yoshino in a 12-round WBC lightweight title eliminator in Newark, New Jersey on Saturday. Stevenson pounded Yoshino for five solid rounds and in the sixth round he finished him to claim the WBC lightweight title.
Stevenson (20-0, 10 KOs) was stripped of his WBC and WBO junior lightweight belts after missing weight ahead of his fight against Robson Conceicao in September. Stevenson beat Conceicao by unanimous decision and moved up to lightweight, a division dominated by undisputed champion Devin Haney.
Stevenson started the fight utilizing his jab. All of jabs was constant and accurate since the bell rung, punch after punch landed — you could hear the pop clear to all the way in the row of the Prudential Center.
The 25-year-old former WBO featherweight and WBO and WBC junior lightweight champion of the world looked very polished and unbeatable.
“I think I’ve even been sharper,” Stevenson said. “But I was very focused, very focused on what I was supposed to do and sticking with what the game plan was.”
Also on Saturday, Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez defeated Cristian Gonzalez to win the open WBO flyweight title in the main event of a DAZN card at the Boeing Center at Tech Port in San Antonio, Texas.
After defending the WBC junior bantamweight title two times, including a unanimous decision victory over Israel Gonzalez in September, Rodriguez (17-0, 11 KOs) moved down one division to face for the vacant WBO flyweight title and accomplish what he set out to do.
Stevenson landed 50.2% of his punches (123-of-245) and 59.8% of his power punches (104-of-174). Yoshino (16-1, 12 KOs), meanwhile, threw far more punches (332) but landed only 36 in the whole bout and didn’t land more than nine punches in any round. Stevenson connected at least 10 punches in every round.
Stevenson’s confidence was building each round. Big shot after big shot landed, and Yoshino was dazed. When Yoshino did throw, he came up short. It was a confidence displayed from the moment Stevenson walked out of his locker room of a his home crowd of over 10,000.
When Stevenson was announced, there was a lot electricity steaming out of the Prudential. Stevenson, with Newark written in black on the front of the waistband of his boxing trunks, made his hometown very proud that night.
Stevenson also said who he would like to face next: Devin Haney.
Haney and Vasiliy Lomachenko are scheduled to fight on May 20 for the undisputed lightweight title. Stevenson said he believes Haney will win that fight — and he’ll then end up taking Haney on.
“Tell him come on,” Stevenson said. “If that’s what he want to do, I don’t know why he would watch that and say that. I’ve never really even seen Devin Haney really even hurt anybody before. He ain’t really got the punching power.
“So if he watched that, he could tell that I could punch. I don’t know what would make him say, ‘Let’s do it.’ Maybe he’s just a competitor. Maybe I just got to respect it.”
After that night, Stevenson said he believes he showed the rest of his new division, the lightweight division, his skills set just keep developing and evolving in each fight.
