ESPN: Egidijus Kavaliauskas vs. Juan Carlos Abreu & Andrés Ponce Ruíz Jr. vs. Kevin Blue Johnson RBR

Round 4

Kavaliauskas is moving forward behind the jab and working through the cut, slapping down as many of Abreu's jabs as he can see coming. Abreu going downstairs with his jab with exaggerated bows at mid-range, very elastic in his upper body movement. Kavaliauskas is trying to catch Abreu on the chin & ribs with his jab & cross respectively as they close the gap while circling, but is mostly skimming his Adam's apple and elbow instead. Abreu is shimmying in the pocket or just a hair outside and popping Kavaliauskas on the face with a lead right hand.

10-9 Abreu, close

39-37 Abreu

 

Round 5

Kavaliauskas is starting to execute some twinkle-toed crossover moves, straight outta the NBA (remember that Lithuania is very strong on the international basketball scene, more so than is the Dominican Republic ) - effectively cutting off the ring as Abreu tries altering his circling rhythm with quick lateral dashes to clip the corners. Kavaliauskas isn't falling for Abreu's feints, waiting until Abreu has twitched a few times and then lunging in with his own body jabs, and only firing when perfectly in range and once he has Abreu on the move. Very nuanced round, lots of adjustments and counter-adjustments, but very few landed blows (of which Kavaliauskas had the lion's share, whilst being the ring general)

10-9 Kavaliauskas

48-47 Abreu

 

Round 6

Kavaliauskas is stalking and leading with left hooks, cutting off Abreu's escape route with straight rights up top, sometimes anticipating perfectly Abreu's trajectory and where he'll be a moment later to land flush. Abreu is becoming stiffer and more rigid, nervous with Kavaliauskas' newfound adroitness in cutting off the ring and scoring from range in explosive bursts, everything building off the jab downstairs. Abreu smothering Kavaliauskas in the clinch and whacking his kidneys with his partially free hand, wrist-flapping. Kavaliauskas is circling to his left, standing off, leaning backward, drawing a lead jab from Abreu and countering up top with line drive 1-2s up at the face.

10-9 Kavaliauskas

57-57

 

Holy hell, round 6, we finally all score one the same.