ATLANTIC CITY – Claressa Shields assured Ivana Habazin on Thursday that there’s nothing her upcoming opponent could say or do that’ll rattle her.
The undefeated, undisputed middleweight champion promised after their weigh-in that the Croatian contender won’t be able to get her off her game inside the ring, either. The heavily favored Shields predicted that she’ll stop Habazin inside of six rounds when they fight Friday night at Ocean Resort Casino.
“She’s soft,” Shields told Showtime’s Steve Farhood after weighing in at a career-low 153¼ pounds. “It’s gonna be six rounds or less – trust me.”
The 24-year-old Shields (9-0, 2 KOs) hasn’t recorded a knockout since her fourth professional fight. Each of the Flint, Michigan, native’s past five fights have gone the 10-round distance, but the two-time Olympic gold medalist expects that trend to end in their scheduled 10-rounder for the vacant WBC and WBO 154-pound titles.
The 30-year-old Habazin (20-3, 7 KOs) has lost by knockout or technical knockout just once. Sweden’s Mikaela Lauren (32-6, 13 KOs) stopped her in the third round of their April 2016 fight for the WBC 154-pound championship.
Habazin contended Thursday that she’ll not only become the first pro opponent to defeat Shields, but that she’ll knock out a fighter who has won world titles at 160 and 168 pounds.
“You’re gonna see,” said Habazin, who officially weighed 152½ pounds. “So, she can talk she’s gonna knock me out, whatever she wants. She doesn’t have the power. She will not knock me out. I have a good defense and I know I have power, so I’m gonna knock her out.”
Habazin taunted Shields at their weigh-in by eating ice cream while standing on the New Jersey State Athletic Control Board’s scale. Shields scoffed at Habazin’s implication that she starved herself to move down from the middleweight limit of 160 pounds.
“I don’t fight off emotion,” Shields said. “That’s why I’m a champion. There’s been plenty of girls who’ve done way worse things than what she’s doing to try to throw me off my square. But when you’re fighting against girls who don’t even speak English, calling you bitches inside in the ring, I don’t think what she’s doing, or her new coach is doing, is supposed to bother me. Nah.”
Shields and Habazin will headline Showtime’s three-fight telecast Friday night (9 p.m. ET/6 p.m. PT).
The second fight of the show will feature one of boxing’s top prospects, Philadelphia welterweight Jaron Ennis (24-0, 22 KOs). He’ll face Kazakhstan’s Bakhtiyar Eyubov (14-1-1, 12 KOs, 1 NC) in a 10-rounder.
The tripleheader will open with a 10-round, 168-pound championship bout between Alicia Napoleon-Espinosa (12-1, 7 KOs), of Lindenhurst, New York, and Sweden’s Elin Cederroos (7-0, 4 KOs). They’ll fight for Napoleon-Espinosa’s WBA super middleweight title and the vacant IBF belt.
Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.