Bryan Chevalier Stops Carlos Zambrano in 3; Danielito Zorilla Def. Ruslan Via 8th Round Technical Decision
PUERTO RICO (March 4, 2021) — Ring City USA returned to NBC Sports Network for its first show of 2021. The promoter held three outdoor cards at Wild Card Gym in the fourth quarter of 2020. Tonight a previously scheduled main event, Serhii Bohachuk versus Brandon Adams, returned as the headliner but the location was Guaynabo, Puerto Rico. Fittingly, Miguel Cotto Promotions was involved with bringing boxing back to the island.
The evening’s co-main event featured Super Featherweights Bryan Chevalier versus Carlos Zambrano scheduled for eight rounds.
Chevalier (15-1-1, 12 KOs) only needed three rounds to dispatch the 36-year old Peruvian. Zambrano (26-2, 11 KOs) last fought in April 2017 – a first round knockout by Claudio Merrero. In total, Chevalier scored three knockdowns, including a questionable one in the first frame, and then twice in Round 3.
Zambrano went down in the final minute of the first round. The two fighters became entangled, but Chevalier kept punching with his free hand. Chevalier threw a right hand that appeared to land behind Zambrano’s head, or neck, but the referee deemed it a knockdown. He beat the count to fight on and completed the round.
Zambrano made the fight ugly in the next frame, with the veteran trying to find a way to gain an edge. However, the 26-year old Puerto Rican unleashed his left hand in the third round. The first knockdown came after a body-head double left hook combination that badly hurt Zambrano. At 2:21 Chevalier attacked Zambrano’s body, and a well-placed left hook to the body collapsed the veteran immediately. Referee Ramon Pena reached the count of 10 and brought the fight to an ed.
In the NBC Sports Network undefeated Super Lightweight Danielito Zorrilla faced Ruslan Madiyev for the right to claim the WBO NABO championship. Zorilla (15-0, 11 KOs), a native of Puerto Rico, looked to control the action through the first several rounds with superior boxing skills. Madiyev (13-2, 5 KOs) pressed forward, fighting his way inside to unload punishment.
Bigger exchanges started to occur in rounds four and five. Madiyev’s pressure began creating openings for his power punches, but his momentum was squandered in Round 5 when he ran out of warnings for illegal punches. He received a 1-point deduction.
Zorilla put his punches together when given space, mixing in hooks to both sides of the body while adding in uppercuts. Madiyev marched forward in Round 6 landing effective right hands. Zorilla’s jab failed to keep Madiyev away, and his legs couldn’t help keep the 28-year old Kazakh at bay neither.
In Round 7, Zorilla continued to vary up his solutions for Madiyev’s pressure. The Puerto Rican punched and moved well through most of the round. Madiyev got inside over the final minute and had his best moments.
Madiyev fought to get his hands free in a clinch, and prior to the two fighters separating he landed another punch to the back of Zorilla’s head. Zorilla staggered away before dropping down to a knee in the far corner. The action stopped for an extended amount of time. Madiyev waited in the opposite neutral corner as Zorilla remained on the ground resting on both knees. The ringside doctor made his way up onto the apron to take a closer look. After several minutes the fight was officially stopped.
Once the scorecards were announced, Zorilla won the fight via technical decision 77-75, 73-76 and 77-74.
Also in Action
Ring City USA streams the preliminary bouts of it cards live on its Twitch account. In the opener of the stream, Welterweight Jorge A. Diaz-Flores’ debut fight ended abruptly after his short counter left hook landed on the fully exposed chin of Luis Felipe Munoz Crespo at :42 in Round 2. The punch came shortly after a short body-head combination from Flores, landed inside a flurry from Munoz (0-1), and drove him away and then down flat onto his back.
Super Lightweights Harold Laguna (2-0, 2 KOs) and newcomer Darwin Alvarez fought second. An early combination of hooks to the body affected Alvarez early in Round 1. Laguna finally picked up on the fact Alvarez was no longer punching, and moved back in for another series of hooks to the body. A left hook to the kneeling Alvarez grazed his chin after the right-left hooks to the body had already done the job at 2:10.
In the final Twitch-streamed bout, 24-year old southpaw Fernando Vargas Jr. (2-0, 2 KOs) took on 36-year old Salome Flores Torres (0-3) in an 8-round Middleweight bout. Vargas landed a left hand that scored his first knockdown at around 1:25. Torres beat the count, but a series of power punches led to a second knockdown, and the referee immediately stopped the fight with :47 left. The victor, by technical knockout, was cornered by his father, former two-time Super Welterweight champion Fernando Vargas Sr.
