In a heated back-and-forth grudge match, undefeated Vernon Paris got off the canvas to score the biggest win of his career to date with a seventh-round stoppage of world ranked Tim Coleman in the ESPN2 Friday Night Fights main event at the Chumash Casino Resort in Santa Ynez, California on Friday night.
Coleman (19-2-1, 5 KOs) of Baltimore, Maryland downed Paris (25-0, 15 KOs) of Detroit, Michigan late in the second-round with a clean right hand. However, the Detroit native got right back into the fight at the start of the third as the action went both ways through five rounds.
Paris, 140, turned the fight in the sixth, as he hurt Coleman, 140, to the body early and eventually downed him twice with left hands downstairs. Coleman, who entered the bout the IBF#5/WBA #14 ranked light welterweight, rose from his knees the second time just before the bell sounded to end the sixth. In between rounds Coleman told his corner he was ready to continue, but Paris made sure not to give him the time he needed to recover.
Seconds into the seventh, Paris forced Coleman to the ropes and placed another solid left to his body. Coleman fell back on his left knee and referee Dan Stell immediately stopped the bout without a count. Official time of the stoppage was 27 seconds of the seventh.
With the victory Paris claims the USBA Light Welterweight title and will likely appear among the top ranked 140-pounders by the IBF when their next rankings are released. The fight had gained additional heat from a war of words between Paris and Coleman on their Facebook pages. When they arrived at the casino hotel Thursday morning, an altercation in the lobby in which Coleman admittedly threw a punch, led to separate weigh-ins and off site lodging for both main event fighters. In a show of good sportsmanship, Coleman moved past the heightened in-ring security to embrace Paris after the fight.
In impressive fashion, lightweight prospect Mike Faragon (16-0, 7 KOs) of Guilderland, New York broke down Ira Terry (24-6, 14 KOs) of Memphis, Tennessee to the body en route to a second-round referee’s stoppage.
Faragon, 134 ¾, ended an aggressive run by Terry, 129, in the second with a right to the body that referee Raul Caiz asked the prospect to keep up. With Terry clearly bothered by the blow, Faragon targeted his midsection with the ensuing onslaught. With Terry still standing but wilting against the ropes, Caiz leaped in to stop the bout. Official time of the stoppage was 2:32 of the second.
What could have evolved into a solid scrap ended prematurely as unbeaten Art Hovhannesyan (14-0-2, 8 KOs) of Glendale, California by way of Gyumri, Armenia clashed heads with former featherweight titleholder Cristobal Cruz (39-12-3, 23 KOs) of Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico in the fourth and ultimately final round.
Ending a long layoff, Cruz, 130, got off to a solid start in the bout landing well with his awkward, winging style. Hovhannesyan, 130, landed one of his better shots, a right hand, just before stepping in with his head. The head clash opened a bad gash just right of center on Cruz’ forehead. Scoring the abbreviated fourth-round under the California rules, each fighter took a card 39-37, with the third judge’s card forcing the draw, 38-38.
Sergio Nunez (3-0-1, 2 KOs) of Maywood, California pounded out a one-sided four-round unanimous decision over debuting Ricardo Cubillas (0-1) of Riverside, California. Nunez, 134 ½, was by far the better schooled boxer, but Cubillas, 135, was game enough to last the distance. In the end, all three judges scored the bout a shutout, 40-36, for Nunez.
