Espinoza stops Khegai after ten in Mexico

Rafael ‘El Divino’ Espinoza (28-0, 24 KOs) retained his WBO featherweight title with a 10th-round stoppage of fringe contender Arnold Khegai (23-3-1, 14 KOs) in the main event at the Arena Coliseo, San Luis Potosi, Mexico on Saturday night.

Uppercuts Do the heavy lifting

Khegai’s corner chose not to allow him to come out for the 11th round because his left eye was cut and badly swollen from the punishment he took from the lanky 6’1″ Espinoza. A clash of heads in round seven caused a cut over Khegai’s left eye, in addition to significant swelling.

Espinoza used his combination of striking and uppercuts on the inside to dominate the much shorter 5’5″ Ukraine-born Khegai. In the seventh and the tenth, Espinoza broke and tried to score a knockout of Khegai by attacking him with a flurry. It didn’t work.

The hand speed, power and mobility of Khegai allowed him to last through the tenth round before he was taken out by his corner.

Early on, the referee cautioned Khegai for throwing rabbit punches as he walked his shots to try to reach the top of Espinoza’s head. He was forced to do so because of Espinoza’s height advantage.

Khegai’s corner hit the panic button

Khegai’s trainer warned him after the eighth round that he was going to stop the fight unless he showed him something. He responded well in the ninth and tenth and nailed Espinoza with big rights to the head which he took well. These were shots that would have hurt many fighters.

The fight was wisely stopped after the tenth by Khegai’s team because he was too beaten and far behind in the game to continue the fight.

Overall, it was a good performance by Espinoza. He showed the same high volume work rate that has worked for him in his recent fights. On the downside, he was often hit hard by Khegai in battle.

Fortunately for Espinoza, he didn’t take enough hits to stagger him as we saw in his first fight against Robeisy Ramirez. Still, tonight’s match showed that Espinoza will get knocked out sooner or later when he comes up against a big enough punch because he’s too easy to hit.

Vargas survives a rough night

In the co-main event, light welterweight Emiliano Vargas (16-0, 12 KOs) defeated veteran Jonathan Montrel (19-4, 15 KOs) via a tougher-than-expected 10-round unanimous decision. Vargas landed a textbook hook in round one, sending Montrel, 35, to his knees.

Although he complained to the referee that he had been punched in the back of the head, he allowed the knock down.

Montrel showed a lot of heart and tried his best to match Vargas with power shots to the body and head. In the final three rounds, Vargas gave up on knocking Montrel out and just focused on winning the decision.

The scores

Delgado scrapes through controversy

Lindolfo Delgado (24-0, 16 KOs) had to get up from the deck in the 12th to defeat Gabriel Gollaz Valenzuela via a controversial 12-round split decision in an IBF light welterweight title eliminator. The scores were 114-113, 114-113 for Delgado and 114-113 for Gollaz.

Delgado was eaten by the more powerful Valenzuela left hooks the entire fight, and he looked like the clear loser.

With the win, the top-ranked DelGado promoter becomes the mandatory challenger for IBF 140-lb champion Richardson Hitchins.