FRISCO, Texas – Austin “Ammo” Williams has secured a new opponent for his fight this weekend.
BoxingScene has confirmed that Williams will now face fellow Texas-based middleweight Ivan Vazquez in a scheduled ten-round contest. Vazquez, 11-0-2 (8 KOs), replaces an injured Etinosa Oliha, 21-0 (9 KOs), who – as first reported by BoxingScene – was forced off Saturday’s DAZN card due to a ruptured vein in his eye.
Williams-Vazquez will take place as part of a DAZN show topped by the Jesse "Bam" Rodriguez-Phumelele Cafu lineal/WBC/WBO 115lbs unification clash. Saturday’s card airs live beginning at 7 p.m. ET (6 p.m. local time) and midnight BST from The Ford Center at the Star in Frisco, Texas.
The stakes and matchup are both a downgrade for Williams, 18-1 (12 KOs), a Milwaukee-born, Houston-based contender originally due to meet Italy’s Oliha in an IBF 160lbs title eliminator. The winner would have become the IBF mandatory challenger to unified titlist Janibek Alimkhanuly, who is currently exploring a voluntary title defense.
BoxingScene has learned that Oliha’s team plans to still push for the eliminator to be rescheduled, given the boxer’s place as the IBF’s highest-rated middleweight contender.
Meanwhile, Williams and his team settled for activity in moving forward with this weekend’s slot since he already endured a full training camp for this show.
Vazquez steps up in class without having to leave his home state.
The 31-year-old boxer – originally from Monterrey, Mexico – has fought exclusively in Texas in a pro career spread out over eleven years. He has largely fought out of the greater Houston area and was in camp for a September 13 bout in Sugar Land, Texas, when he got the call for this opportunity.
Saturday will mark Vazquez’s first scheduled ten-round affair. He’s only been past six rounds once, which came in a June 2023 majority draw against Reshard Hicks. Two knockout wins have followed, versus lesser competition.
Williams has won two in a row since an 11th-round stoppage defeat to Hamzah Sheeraz, 22-0-1 (18 KOs) last June in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. In his most recent contest, Williams outpointed Patrice Volny atop a March 15 DAZN show from Caribe Royale Resort in Orlando, Florida.
