WBO Welterweight Champion Paul Williams stepped up to light middle and caged the vacant WBO belt by stopping former three time 154 pound world titlist Verno Phillips in the eighth round at Citizens Bank Arena in Ontario, CA in the highest profile bout in America this weekend.

Williams overcame a bad cut from a headclash early on and used his massive height and reach advantage to good effect, keeping the much older Phillips at bay with hard shots to the body and head.

It was the constant body shots which seemed to take their toll on the former champion as he began to slow down later in the bout but Phillips also didn't have the power to trouble his far taller opponent despite not having much difficulty in hitting Williams when he did throw punches.

By the eighth round, Phillips was getting hurt and the bout was called to a halt before the ninth frame could begin to keep the 39 year old from further damage.

Williams wins the WBO Light Middle title, improving to 36-1 (27), while Phillips drops to 42-11-1 (21) after a brave performance in what could be the last big fight of his long career. More...

All in all, it was a pretty good Saturday night and we start off south of the border with a big card in Queretaro, Mexico where at the Plaza de Toros Juriquilla, light middleweight contender Julio Cesar Chavez, Jr., 36-0-1 (29), continued his meteoric rise with a ninth round KO of Italy's 154 lb titlist Tobia Guiseppe Loriga, 24-1-1 (6).

The Italian started aggressively but a patient Chavez scored with effective counters and floored the visitor in the second frame. The European fought his way out of trouble and resumed the pressure but didn't have enough power to interrupt the flow of Chavez, who continued to reduce Loriga's energy with carefully selected hurtful counters.

Once he had worn his rival down, Chavez began to go on the offensive and was extracting a heavy toll on Loriga before straining an ankle in the seventh. Despite the injury, Chavez nailed Loriga with a full-blooded right hand that had the Italian Champion taking a much needed knee as he was counted out at 1:47 of the ninth frame. More...