By Jake Donovan
Cristian Mijares picks up his second consecutive win following a unanimous decision win over Lester Medrano in their 10-round featherweight bout Saturday evening in Cancun, Mexico.
Scores were 99-91 across the board.
Medrano threatened to spoil the party early in the bout, but was merely Mijares getting off to a slow start. The former two-time super flyweight titlist eventually found his way around the ring in round two, and safely boxed his way to victory.
The 33-year old southpaw picked up steam in the second half of the contest, but had less motivation to go all out after hearing through open scoring that he was way up on all three scorecards after eight rounds.
With the win, Mijares advances to 51-8-2 (25KOs). His 2014 campaign began with a wide points loss to Leo Santa Cruz in a super bantamweight title fight, but that hasn't discouraged him from continuing to eye big game. In his sights is a possible showdown with countryman and featherweight titlist Jhonny Gonzalez at some point in 2015.
Medrano comes up short in his first fight outside of Nicaragua, falling to 14-3-1 (9KOs).
The bout headlined live on Televisa in Mexico and via slight delay on Fox Deportes in the United States.
UNDERCARD
Yuriorkis Gamboa picked up his first win in 17 months, scoring a sixth-round stoppage of Joel Montes de Oca (18-4, 10KOs).
Not much action was to be found for much of the bout, which came to a sudden ending when a left hook rocked and dropped Montes de Oca in the first minute of round six. A mandatory eight count was issued, at which point the fallen fighter rose to his feet, but failed to properly respond to the referee's commands, thus forcing an immediate stoppage.
The bout took place just about the super featherweight limit, but Gamboa (24-1, 17KOs) insists that another run at a lightweight title remains very much in his future. Such dreams remain an uphill climb for however long Terence Crawford chooses to remain in the weight class. The two fought in June, with Gamboa suffering a 9th round stoppage loss in one of the best fights of the year.
Opening the telecast, Erica Farias boxed her way to a strangely scored 10-round decision win over Alejandra Olivares. Scores were 98-93 and 97-94 in favor of Farias (21-1, 10KOs) and 99-92 for Olivares (31-3-2, 16KOs) in their 10-round super lightweight contest.
Jake Donovan is the Managing Editor of BoxingScene.com, as well as a member of Transnational Boxing Ratings Board and the Boxing Writers Association of America. Twitter: @JakeNDaBox