O’Shaquie Foster beats Abraham Nova by split decision to retain title: Highlights

O’Shaquie Foster took a split decision win over Abraham Nova, retaining his WBC super featherweight title in an ESPN main event from New York.

Foster won two cards on scores of 115-112 and 116-111, while the third went to Nova, 114-113. Bad Left Hook unofficially scored the fight 115-112 for Foster, who really sealed the win with a strong 12th round that included a knockdown.

The knockdown itself likely didn’t play into the cards much, as it seemed Foster was winning the 12th round anyway, but it became a sure 10-8 instead of a probable 10-9.

Foster (22-2, 12 KO) has now won 12 straight fights, and made the second successful defense of the belt he beat Rey Vargas to claim a year ago.

Nova (23-2, 16 KO) comes up short in his first world title fight, and you’d have to say he’s 0-2 against his two best opponents so far, but he gave a solid effort and was in this fight the whole way. He could wind up back in another world title fight before you know it. If Joet Gonzalez can get that money, why not the guy with the mascot?

Andres Cortes TKO-4 Bryan Chevalier (2:17)

Cortes (21-0, 12 KO) really did not look good on the scales yesterday, but he came out aggressive and pretty well dominated this fight, pushing Chevalier (20-2-1, 16 KO) back constantly, landing good body shots, and doing little bits of damage.

Chevalier was staggered a bit just before the stoppage, and his corner had seen enough, calling for the end there.

The win keeps Cortes highly-rated with the WBO at 130 lbs, and he keeps fighting like a real contender.

Bruce Carrington TKO-4 Bernard Torres (2:59)

That’s a “TKO” because the referee stopped it before reaching a 10-count. He’d have probably reached a 10-count if he’d wanted to go that route.

Carrington (11-0, 7 KO) continues to be pushed extremely hard by the public relations team playing ESPN broadcast journalists, but he really does keep just showing up, and it really might be time to get him an even better fight.

He got Jason Sanchez out in two in December, got Torres out in four here with a great right hand — I’m not saying it’s time for a top 10 opponent, but he’s 26 years old and has the ambition, and the skills keep proving out.

Top Rank truly do have an extremely good matchmaking team that know their business, but from the outside I’d love to see Carrington against, say, Angelo Leo or Joet Gonzalez this summer.