Kovalev easily down passive Pascal

It was Roach who ultimately stopped the fight after the seventh round, knowing his fighter had no chance and only risked further damage. He landed 165 of 412 punches (40%), compared to a paltry 30 of 108 (28%) from Pascal.

Let Pascal come forward and exchange: Jean Pascal has always been known as a rather low output fighter who isn’t necessarily the biggest power puncher, thus Sergey should be content to get in a firefight with Jean if he is courageous enough. Kovalev, who came into the ring looking leaner and more angular than ever-almost skinny, in fact (think: Bob Foster)-dominated from the start.

However, Kovalev apparently didn’t fulfil his pre-fight wish to end his career because 33-year-old Pascal vowed to keep fighting. Kovalev told the crowd of 9,866 at the Bell Centre, immediately following the fight, that he purposely extended it to make Pascal suffer more.

Sergey Kovalev deserved credit for a knockdown in round one when a stiff jab dropped an off-balance Pascal to the seat of his trousers. Regardless of how one feels about Kovalev’s alleged racism, in terms of the fight itself, the “Krusher” accomplished exactly what he set out to do.

“Oh, wait, they stopped the fight before the eighth round”.

“I was much better prepared this time because it was a personal fight”, said Kovalev. Pascal met his match against Kovalev, and there was nothing he could do to beat a guy like him no matter what he did. Roach tried to turn Pascal into a boxer in one camp. When the round was over, a tired Pascal returned to his corner and plopped down on his stool, and Roach signaled to Griffin to halt the fight, which Kovalev was leading 70-62 on all three scorecards. In 2014, Kovalev faced veteran fighter Bernard Hopkins to win the IBF and WBA (Super) Light Heavyweight titles and defended his WBO light heavyweight title at the same time.

“Kovalev is a great champion. I’m happy that I did it”.

The crowd roared as the two Montreal fighters went toe-to-toe over 10 rounds, with 43-year-old St-Juste (26-5-1) barely hanging on to the final bell against 27-year-old Lafreniere (11-5-2).

There was more action in interviews post-fight, while Adonis Stevenson rushed to the ring after that Kovalev was that prior to face Andre Ward in the fall, he would like face “Chickenson” which clearly did not appreciate the insult. This was immediately after Kovalev had referred to Stevenson as “Adonis Chicken-son” and delivered a series of derisive clucks. Then Stevenson proposed a purse bid, but Kovalev’s side said they couldn’t do that because of contractual obligations to HBO.

Kovalev taunted Stevenson by making a quacking noise, prompting Stevenson to jump in the ring and make a weak attempt at starting a fight.