Keisher McLeod Wells out-pointed a game Patty Alcivar over ten
rounds in the semi-windup of New Legend Promotions' ten bout
card at the Resorts World Casino in Queens, NY before a standing
room crowd of New York fight fans on Saturday night. The bout
was contested for the vacant NY State Flyweight championship and
McLeod, utilizing a significant height and reach advantage,
dictated the pace of the fight from the opening bell, despite
the best efforts of
Alcivar to force the fight into close quarters.. The night's
card featured fighters from a diverse combination of locales
ranging from Budapest, Hungary thru Madrid, Spain, along with
Puerto Rico and Atlanta and San Francisco. The McLeod/Alcivar
bout, however, matched two New Yorkers from different boroughs,
Brooklyn (McLeod Wells) and Queens (Alcivar) and proved to be
one of the more interesting strategic matchups of the night.
The long standing adage concerning bicycle riding is that once
you learn how you never forget. McLeod, who was last in the ring
a year and a half ago and who came to the bout at 106.4 lbs.,
seemingly learned, early in her career, how to throw an
effective left jab. And Saturday night in Queens against Alcivar,
111.2, McLeod reinforced the fact that that she hasn't
forgotten. The first seven rounds were almost carbon copies of
each previous stanza. McLeod emerged from her corner with a left
jab in front of her and kept Alcivar on the end of that jab for
much of the round. At the urging of her corner and the sizable
contingent of her fans in the overflow crowd, Alcivar tried,
relentlessly, to duck under the jab and work herself inside,
within punching range of the taller fighter. Even when this
strategy occasionally worked, McLeod's rejoinder was to move
left or right, away from the hard charging Alcivar or,
alternately, to clinch and wait to be separated by referee Nigel
Griffin.
The final three rounds of the bout were the best for Alcivar.
Whether it was McLeod tiring slightly or Alcivar's indomitable
will reaping a modicum of success, the Queens fighter seemed to,
intermittently, be able to getting inside the jab of her taller
opponent even, occasionally, forcing McLeod into the ropes. The
die of the decision was, however, at this point, cast, given the
dominance of McLeod in the first seven rounds. Alcivar, however,
surely realizing she was far behind on the judges' cards, kept
going forward until the final bell. Two of the ring arbiters,
Bernard Bruni and Robin Taylor saw McLeod winning all ten rounds
and cast 100-90 votes, while Tom Carusone scored it 97-93 for
the Brooklyn fighter. I gave Alcivar rounds eight and nine. The
win raised the new NY State title holder's record to 8-2, while
Alcivar dropped to 8-4.
In a featured six round under-card attraction, Long Island's
Alicia Napoleon raised her nascent professional record to 2-0
with a third round TKO of Melinda Lazar of the aforementioned
Budapest. Napoleon, demonstrating sit down punching power, is a
powerfully built middleweight and came to the bout at 155.2, two
pounds more than Lazar, although, in the ring, the physical
disparity looked considerably more marked. Napoleon dominated
the first two rounds, stalking Lazar and finally in the third
round caught her opponent with a big right hand and landed
several subsequent unanswered punches prompting referee Gary
Rosato to call a halt one minute into the third stanza. Lazar's
emerging record goes to 1-1.
Bernie McCoy
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