David Stevens was supposed to be the measuring stick that told long-time amateur Petr Khamukov whether he was ready, at 33, to make up for lost time and step up his competition.
Then Stevens gave Khamukov an answer he wouldn’t have wanted to hear, earning a unanimous decision win on Friday at Thunder Studios in Long Beach, California, to hand Khamukov his first loss and leave the 2016 Russian Olympian in professional limbo.
As unsightly as the physical fight was at times, and as difficult as it had to have been to score, all three judges arrived at the same result – 97-93 for Stevens.
Khamukov, from Rabinsk, Russia, and training out of Woodland Hills, California, doesn’t have the luxury of a slow climb through the ranks. So after he dispatched Vaughn Alexander and Esau Herrera de la Cruz in 2024 in his first eight-rounders, his first 10-rounder – against a credible opponent in Stevens – was in order. But it proved to be too big a challenge. Perhaps even literally.
The 25-year-old Stevens, 16-2 (10 KOs), of Reading, Pennsylvania, appeared to be the larger and stronger fighter in the ring on Friday, and he regularly got the better of the numerous inside battles early on.
But Khamukov, 13-1 (6 KOs), came on in the third, landing a nifty 1-2 midway through the third. Later, he caught a ducking Stevens with an uppercut, then forced him to eat a right hand. Although unhurt, the sequence compelled Stevens to pinch Khamukov’s arms under his elbows and take a moment to regroup. Stevens got what he needed, ducking a left hand and countering with his own looping left – then landing another squarely on Khamukov’s jaw at the end of the round.
In the fourth Stevens did a better job of leveraging his size, walking down Khamukov and getting the best of the exchanges during their frequent tie-ups. Before the bell he slipped a pair of punches from Khamukov and landed a shot of his own.
Khamukov had most of his success at mid-range, and he began the fifth with a jab and a long right hand to the body. But he would too often run out of real estate in the ring, with Stevens bullying him to the ropes and then working his body and landing sniping headshots with short, downward strokes from close range.
In the sixth, there was more wrestling and not nearly enough clean punching, but Stevens did manage to draw blood from the bridge of Khamukov’s nose. Khamukov helped even things when, after Stevens lost his mouthpiece and referee Ray Corona called time, replaced it and reconvened the action, the Russian got off a quality three-punch combination – again at mid-range.
The struggle for Khamukov was keeping the fight there. In the eighth, Stevens seemed to become more cognizant of where his advantage lay, peppering Khamukov at distance and landing occasional power behind his jab. Khamukov leapt forward with a clean left hand and a stinging jab before the end of the round to keep things close. It was impossible to know what the judges were seeing, or what sort of action they favored.
In the ninth, Khamukov landed a pair of sharp left hands early, but he then spent more time latching on to Stevens than letting his hands go. Stevens seemed hesitant to pull the trigger himself and closed the gap too often, walking directly into his opponent’s bear hugs. If each fighter thought he was being the more clever of the two, neither gained an advantage – and only the viewing audience suffered for it.
Sprawling after an ugly slip in the 10th, Khamukov immediately responded with a three-punch combo punctuated by a hard left hand that snapped Stevens’ head back. He scored again with a right hand and, in a tie-up, a left uppercut that seemed to catch Stevens by surprise. Stevens recovered with a rare combination and some solid body work, but he ended the bout as he fought it – with no signature punches or sequences that clearly put him over the top.
Although Khamukov appeared far worse for wear than his opponent after the fight, Stevens acknowledged that it wasn’t his best work.
“I gotta rewatch the tape,” Stevens said. “I know I made some mistakes in there, I got a little tired... I gotta sharpen up on some things.”
Meanwhile, although Friday’s defeat doesn’t have to be the end of the line for Khamukov, it would seem to be an indicator that any world-title ambitions he may have had are, at this stage, beyond his grasp.
Jason Langendorf is the former Boxing Editor of ESPN.com, was a contributor to Ringside Seat and the Queensberry Rules, and has written about boxing for Vice, The Guardian, Chicago Sun-Times and other publications. A member of the Boxing Writers Association of America, he can be found at LinkedIn and followed on X and Bluesky.