By Richard Thomas at ringside (Photo: Richie Maldonado)

On Friday, August 26th, Sycuan and Northeast Promotions brought boxing to the Westchester County Center in White Plains, New York to showcase a main event attraction with Joan Guzman fighting Terdsak Jandaeng in a 12 round WBO featherweight title elimination bout, along with other great fights.

In the main event Guzman and Jandaeng went at it in a grueling 12 round fight.  From the start of the first round Guzman seemed kind of cautious, while Jandaeng started to move around and slip punches.  In the second round Guzman picked up the pressure by coming forward and throwing hard shots.  Jandaeng never backed down, and fired back with his own artillery.  The same continued in the following three rounds.  In round six, Guzman connected with a combination that went from the body to the head.  He eventually ended the combination with a left hook to the head that dropped Jandaeng.  Jandaeng made it to his feet and poured some pressure on Guzman. 

In rounds 7-9 Jandaeng was aware that he was behind on the scorecards and stopped boxing, and came forward throwing lots of punches to the body and head.  Jandaeng even scored with some terrific punches to the head when Guzman dropped his hands.  But at the same time Guzman became more in control and played around with Jandaeng.  From rounds 10-12 Guzman threw combos after combos, and was showing off with his lighting hand speed.  The fight ended and the judges scored the fight 119-108 (twice), and 117-110 to the victor by unanimous decision Joan Guzman.            

WBA #5 ranked welterweight Carlos Quintana (21-0, 17 KO’s) threw a right hook out of nowhere and knocked out Dillon Carew (18-14-3, 12 KO’s) at 1:27 of the first round.  Both southpaws came out and boxed with their right jab.  But all it took was a right kook from Quintana to end the fight.  Carew hit the ground and was struggling to move his body but that one punch numbed him, which led the referee to count all the way to ten.    

Hometown favorite jr. welterweight female boxer Ann Marie Saccurato (9-1-2, 4 KO’s) lost her first fight, as she took on the experienced Belinda Laracuente (22-10-2, 9 KO’s) in a scheduled six round fight.  In the first two rounds Saccurato pressed the action and connected with hard shots to the body and head.  But at the same time Laracuente was taking the shots gallantly and was boxing around on her toes while flicking jabs.  When round three came around Laracuente continued to box and give lateral movement. 

But she added one more thing to her arsenal – she began to throw lightning quick combinations that kept Saccurato at a standstill and snapped her head back.  The crowd began to cheer for Laracuente as she continued that style of fighting up until the sixth and final round.  One judge scored the fight 58-56 for Saccurato, and the two other judges scored the fight 58-56 and 59-55 for the winning by split decision – Belinda Laracuente. 

OTHER BOUTS:

Middleweight Bryant Pappas (3-0, 3 KO’s) scored a TKO over Dwayne Reid (0-3) when Reid’s corner stopped the action in the corner in between the intermission of the first and second round.

Curtis Jones scored a TKO victory in the 4th and final round over fellow middleweight Shawn Williams (4-6, 2 KO’s).  Jones took Williams apart after he repeatedly beat the taller Williams to the body.  Williams went down in the 3rd round after receiving a strong uppercut to the midsection.  In the 4th round Jones went back to the body again, and scored another knockdown.  The referee immediately stopped the fight after he saw that Williams had enough.  The fight ended at 1:30 of the 4th round.     

On the other side, Curtis Jones’ brother Corey Jones made his professional debut against very good competition and lost after taking too many body blows from junior middleweight James Moore (2-0, 1 KO).  Moore was frustrated after the illusive Jones slipped punches to the head, and grabbed.  Moore then decided to go to the body where Jones could not elude those punches.  Jones began to become tired, and had nothing left in the tank to commit an offense.  The fight went the full four rounds and all three judges scored the fight 39-37.

In a woman’s featherweight bout pro debuting Maureen Shea scored a 39 second TKO over Camille Casson (0-5).