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Fight Week: Michael Conlan, Leigh Wood set for featherweight showdown

michael rosenthal
·3 min read

FIGHT WEEK

Former Olympian Michael Conlan will face contender Leigh Wood in an important 126-pound bout Saturday in England. On Friday, 154-pound contender Ardreal Holmes is the featured fighter on ShoBox.

Ardreal Holmes (11-0, 5 KOs) vs. Vernon Brown (13-1-1, 9 KOs)

  • When: Friday, March 11

  • Time: 9:35 p.m. ET / 6:35 p.m. PT (main event later in show)

  • Where: Deadwood Mountain Grand, Deadwood, South Dakota

  • TV/Stream: Showtime

  • Division: Junior middleweight

  • Rounds: 10

  • At stake: No major titles

  • Pound-for-pound ranking: None

  • Odds: NA

  • Also on the card: Luis Acosta vs. Edwin De Los Santos, lightweights; Giovanni Marquez vs. Nelson Morales, junior welterweights

  • Prediction: Holmes UD

  • Background: Six-foot-2 junior middleweight prospect Ardreal Holmes will face once-beaten Vernon Brown in the “ShoBox: The New Generation” main event. Holmes was an accomplished amateur, including serving as an alternate on the U.S. Olympic team in 2016. He can box. The product of Flint, Michigan, is coming off a third-round knockout of Jose Antonio Abreu in November 2019, meaning he will have been out of the ring for more than two years. His most-impressive victory was probably a six-round decision over veteran Lanardo Tyner in May 2019. The fight on Friday will be the 27-year-old Holmes’ first scheduled 10-rounder. He’ll have a significant height advantage over Brown, who is 5-foot-7. The 32-year-old southpaw from Chicago last fought in February of last year, when he knocked out Fabian Lyimo in two rounds. Brown’s only setback came by a 10-round decision against Jamontay Clark, the fighter who drew with Sebastian Fundora. That was Brown’s only other scheduled 10-rounder.

Leigh Wood (25-2, 15 KOs) vs. Michael Conlan (16-0, 8 KOs)

  • When: Saturday, March 12

  • Time: 2 p.m. ET / 11 a.m. PT (main event later in show)

  • Where: Nottingham Arena, Nottingham

  • TV/Stream: DAZN

  • Division: Featherweight

  • Rounds: 12

  • At stake: WBA secondary title

  • Pound-for-pound ranking: None

  • Odds: Conlan 1½-1 favorite (average of multiple outlets)

  • Also on the card: Terri Harper vs. Yamila Belen Abellaneda, lightweights; Caoimhin Agyarko vs. Juan Carlos Rubio, middleweights; Gary Cully vs. Miguel Vazquez, lightweights

  • Prediction: Conlan UD

  • Background: 2016 Olympian Michael Conlan could take a significant step Saturday toward his first world title shot. The 30-year-old Irish fighter takes on contender Leigh Wood of England is the biggest test of his pro career, which started in 2017. Conlan, from Belfast, is coming off a wide unanimous-decision victory over TJ Doheny in August of last year, seven months ago. That followed a scare against Ionut Baluta, who lost a majority decision to Conlan the previous April. Wood, a secondary WBA titleholder, is considered a Top 10 126-pounder worldwide. The native of Nottingham lost a tight majority decision to Jazza Dickens in February 2020 but has won two in a row since, a ninth-round TKO of Reece Mould a year later and a 12th-round TKO of Can Xu this past July to win his secondary belt. Leo Santa Cruz is the WBA champion. Wood is 33, which adds urgency for him. He needs to move quickly if he hopes to fight for a major world title.

Also fighting this week: Savannah Marshall (11-0, 9 KOs) of England defends her WBO middleweight title against Femke Hermans (12-3, 5 KOs) of Belgium on Saturday in Newcastle, England (No TV in U.S.). And Fatih Keles (14-1, 8 KOs) of Turkey fights Diego Chaves (28-8-1, 23 KOs) of Argentina in a junior middleweight bout Saturday in Dubai (FITE).