By Steve Kim
With his second round stoppage of Vyacheslav Shabranskyy this past weekend, Sergey Kovalev (31-2, 27 KOs) captured the vacant WBO light heavyweight title. Kovalev remains the centerpiece of a loaded light heavyweight division, which includes other belt-holders like Artur Beterbiev (IBF) and Dmity Bivol (WBA).
So what are the chance of unification bouts taking place in the near future?
"It's naturally going to lead to that, they all want to fight each other and they're all interesting fights. With the exception of the WBC champion (Adonis Stevenson), " said Kathy Duva, the head of Main Events, which represents Kovalev and just recently entered into a deal with Bivol (12-0, 10 KOs) and World of Boxing.
She added - "I think there's certainly a point we're going to reach whether it's total unification next year or the the year after, I don't know. But that's certainly the idea."
One of the most intriguing and explosive bouts that could be made in all of boxing is a showdown between Kovalev and Bivol. And Duva believes that is certainly a possibility.
"It would seem to be, look, Sergey my feeling is that he did prove (Sunday night) that he is the man to beat in the division. He's back to where he was. If anybody wants to claim to be the best light heavyweight in the world they have to go through him, these guys one-by-one," Duva said.
Kovalev is slated to return on March 3rd back at the Theater at Madison Square Garden and there is a chance that Bivol will be the co-headliner on that show which would be broadcast by HBO.
"There will be some interesting fights in the meantime. We have so many good fighters in this division that any pairing looks like a terrific fight,"said Duva."
Steve Kim is the news editor for BoxingScene.com