By Jake Donovan
They began the night as bitter longtime rivals. By night’s end, Antonio Escalante and Miguel Roman earned each other’s respect, while giving boxing fans their money’s worth in a terrific featherweight brawl at the Don Haskins Center in El Paso, Texas.
In the end, it was Escalante coming out on top, withstanding Roman’s relentless pressure to score a late knockdown en route to a well-deserved unanimous decision in the main event of ESPN2’s Friday Night Fights.
Escalante had his hands full in the early going, with Roman content to serve as the aggressor. The opening round served as a blueprint for much of the fight; Escalante measuring up Roman and alternating between boxing and trading, while Roman continued to charge forward, with no regard for a jab or defense.
Roman’s aggression paid off towards the end of the first, landing a digging left hook that forced Escalante backwards. It also forced the house fighter – playing the venue for his third straight fight – to revert to boxer mode at the start of the second, tripling up on his jab in efforts to keep Roman at bay.
It looked good, but wasn’t terribly effective for the purpose it was supposed to serve; nothing was going to prevent Roman from fighting at a phone booth’s distance.
Roman refused to ease off of the gas against his long time rival. Escalante did his best to mix it up rather than get caught up in a brawl, but wasn’t throwing with enough conviction to change the tempo of the fight. The hometown crowd rallied behind their guy late in the round, with chants of “Tony!” filling the arena.
It provided enough of a boost for Escalante to come out far more purposeful in the fourth, throwing in combination the moment he left his stool. Roman was unfazed, and kept coming with his attack. Escalante stood his ground and elected to trade, enjoying some of his best moments of the fight in the round.
Unfortunately, momentum didn’t spill over into the fifth.
Roman stunned Escalante early in the round with a left hook, and unloaded for virtually the entire three-minute frame. Escalante’s fighting heart enabled him to survive, occasionally landing a shot up the middle, but was forced to absorb for most of the round.
Desperate to swing things back in his favor, Escalante picked up the pace in the sixth. Roman continued to come forward, but failed to adjust once Escalante implemented something as simple as a clinch into his game plan. It was never to the point of being offensive, just enough to provide that split second to get out of harm’s way and resume offensive control.
The change in tactics gave Escalante more confidence in the seventh. The jab and straight right hand was working for the hometown kid, with Roman making things all too easy by plodding forward.
Combination punching was key in Escalante resuming control of the fight, as well as digging body shots that managed to stop Roman in his tracks whenever he remembered to throw them. For a moment, it appeared to take its toll on him, as he slowed down in the eighth, enough to offer the perception that Roman was winning the round through sheer aggression.
That argument went away with about 30 seconds to go in the round. A right hand to the temple began a rally, with Escalante landing several head shots which eventually forced Roman to the canvas.
The sequence was enough to lead Escalante to believe he could coast down the stretch, and for Roman to fight as if he needed a knockout to win. Escalante had no intention of giving him that opportunity, using every inch of the ring to stay the hell away. Roman wasn’t having any of it, at one point standing in mid-ring with arms folded, daring his foe to stand and fight.
Escalante momentarily bit, but went back on the run, wisely spending most of the round playing defense. He was getting a little too cute for his own good; his fatigue level was rapidly dropping while Roman targeted the body.
A burst of energy overcame Escalante in the opening moments of the final round, who came out blazing and drew the capacity crowd to its feet. Roman tried in vain to turn things around, realizing that time was his enemy, but could never surge ahead. Escalante closed strong, busting up Roman’s face.
The two fighters traded down the stretch and to the final bell, before embracing at center ring, signaling that the rivalry was permanently behind them, settling their differences like men as the crowd saluted both fighters with a rousing ovation.
More good news was delivered to the locals upon the reading of the final scores. Gerardo Venzor and Raul Valencia each saw the bout 96-93, with Levi Martinez one point wider at 97-92, all for Escalante, now 23-2 (14KO).
Roman falls to 28-7 (20KO), dropping his second straight.
It was the type of fight Escalante needed to survive as he makes the transition from resurging prospect to budding featherweight contender. Having now won nine straight, the 24-year old is now a legitimate player in a suddenly loaded featherweight division.
The televised co-feature saw undefeated junior welterweight prospect Danny Garcia go from a boy to a man – only to be forced to sweat out the final outcome of his 10-round bout with divisional gatekeeper Ashley Theopane.
Garcia (16-0, 10KO) appeared to win the fight by a wider margin than the final scores suggested, but did himself no favor by allowing Theophane (25-4-1, 7KO) to control the pace early in the fight. Things got going for the Philly native around the fourth round or so, getting the better of Theopane down the stretch.
A ninth-round point deduction for a low blow proved to be more damaging than Garcia sensed would be the case. A strong close turned out to provide the margin of victory that, while competitive, had no business being as close as the judges claimed things to be.
Levi Martinez saw Theopane doing enough to barely win by a score of 95-94, but was thankfully overruled by Gerardo Venzor and Raul Valencia, who had Garcia winnig by scored of 96-94 and 95-94, respectively.
Jake Donovan is the Managing Editor of Boxingscene.com and an award-winning member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. Contact Jake at JakeNDaBox@gmail.com .
