Egidijus Kavaliauskas knows Terence Crawford was hurt.

The Lithuanian welterweight saw it in the unbeaten WBO champion’s eyes once he landed a right hand in the third round of their title fight last December 14 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Crawford contends Kavaliauskas’ shot didn’t hurt him, but Kavaliauskas isn’t surprised Crawford denied that the punch impacted him.

Kavaliauskas also feels he should’ve been credited for becoming the first opponent to drop Crawford, who went to canvas as he leaned forward and grabbed Kavaliauskas around the waist after absorbing that shot.

“I saw it in his eyes,” Kavaliauskas told BoxingScene.com. “I saw that I hurt him. But he recovered fast. He recovered fast from that punch. But I think everybody saw that he [went] down.”

Kavaliauskas connected with a straight right hand with 1:35 to go in the third round that made Crawford bend over and wrap his arms around Kavaliauskas. Crawford’s left knee touched the canvas two seconds later, but referee Ricky Gonzalez ruled that Crawford didn’t go down as the result of Kavaliauskas’ punch.

“I think it was a knockdown, but the referee made his decision,” Kavaliauskas said. “So, there’s nothing to blame. It is what it is.”

Crawford recovered quickly in the third round. The Omaha, Nebraska, native later knocked Kavaliauskas to the canvas once in the seventh round and twice early in the ninth round.

Gonzalez stopped their fight 44 seconds into the ninth round.

The 32-year-old Kavaliauskas (21-1-1, 17 KOs) is preparing for his first fight since Crawford defeated him, a 10-rounder against Quebec’s Mikael Zewski (34-1, 23 KOs) on Saturday night in Las Vegas. He cannot help but wonder, however, what would’ve happened had he been able to capitalize on that quick sequence in the third round against Crawford (36-0, 27 KOs).

“Crawford is a good fighter,” Kavaliauskas said. “That’s for sure. He’s the best welterweight for now. But we learned that everyone is beatable. We learned from the mistakes that I made in that fight, losing my focus and losing my head in the middle of the fight. I just went blasting in the middle rounds, so we learned that we need to be patient.”

Kavaliauskas couldn’t follow up after making Crawford hold him because Crawford composed himself soon thereafter and fired back punches of his own.

“I didn’t jump on him right away because I saw that he recovered pretty fast from that,” Kavaliauskas said. “So, I was just staying patient. I didn’t want to go busting in, just going wild and crazy.”

Kavaliauskas-Zewski will headline an ESPN+ stream set to start at 7:30 p.m. ET/4:30 p.m. PT from MGM Grand Conference Center. In the co-feature, Colombia’s Miguel Marriaga (29-3, 25 KOs) and Joet Gonzalez (23-1, 14 KOs), of Glendora, California, will square off in a 10-round featherweight fight.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.