Early on, Itauma looked quicker and was able to land powerful punches at will. Hrgovic was knocked down in round two when he touched his glove to the canvas to help steady himself. It seemed like a matter of time before Itauma would stop Hrgovic. But Filip Hrgovic weathered the initial Itauma onslaught, and kept absorbing the thudding blows from a man eleven years his junior. Hrgovic was able to land a bit more as the fight progressed, but Itauma kept throwing and kept landing. Through eight rounds, Itauma had a 146-61 edge in punches landed.
In Itauma’s fourteen pro fights prior to Saturday night, he had competed in just 31 rounds total. The only two fights that did not end in a knockout victory for Itauma were only six-rounders. Going into the ninth round was uncharted territory for Itauma. Not just uncharted, but treacherous territory. Against the toughest opponent of his career, on the biggest stage, competing with the biggest stakes on the line.
Round nine began with Hrgovic pressing Itauma, who was already a bit winded. Itauma was initially able to counter with clean counter punches of his own. But then he started missing– wildly. Propelling his arms forward for these hard shots and then having to pull his arms back towards his body completely sapped whatever energy remained for Itauma.
Hrgovic landed more than half of his power punches in the ninth round, walloping a drained Itauma with 28 of his 54 attempts. In the first eight rounds, Hrgovic connected with a total of 36 power punches, landing less than 30% of his attempts. In a fight he was almost undoubtedly losing every round in, two and a half minutes later Hrgovic was the IBF world champion.
“I was losing every round. I was outboxed,” Hrgovic said. “And I don’t know from where I got energy in that round. He gassed out. I knew I was losing. But I knew that I had that pace in my favor.”
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Conditioning, inexperience, and Filip Hrgovic combined to knock Moses Itauma off of his road to the top of the heavyweight division. Itauma also showed his youth on Friday night at the pre-fight weigh-in, when he pushed Hrgovic off of the stage and sparked a melee. Had Itauma captured the heavyweight championship, the incident would have become a footnote, if not forgotten. Now it is a point in the argument against Moses Itauma being ready to be heavyweight champion.
The heavyweight division is in a transitional period. The top four heavyweights of the last decade, Oleksandr Usyk, Tyson Fury, Anthony Joshua, and Deontay Wilder, are all nearing the end of their professional careers. For a division that spent the first part of the 21st century commanded by Wladimir Klitschko and Vitali Klitschko, it was a welcome development for those four men to shepherd the current iteration of the heavyweight division.
It seemed like a foregone conclusion that Moses Itauma would start cementing his name as the next generational talent of the heavyweight division. Maybe he still will. But the night of August 29th, and now the IBF world heavyweight championship, belonged to Filip Hrgovic.
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