Williams, Arreola "heavy" favorites

Mark Ortega

Tonight’s HBO Boxing After Dark card features two intriguing matchups in the inaugural boxing show at Ontario , California ’s new Citizens Bank Arena. In tonight’s main event, Paul Williams [35-1, 26 KOs ] seeks his second world title when he takes on Verno Phillips [42-10-1, 21 KOs ] for the interim WBO Junior Middleweight championship. The co-featured bout is an IBF eliminator between undefeated Mexican-American heavyweight Chris Arreola [25-0, 22 KOs ] and Travis Walker [ 28-1-1 , 22 KOs ].

Williams and Arreola were both featured on the same Versus card at the end of September and both fighters scored exciting knockouts. Williams made his middleweight debut in a first round knockout of the game Andy Kolle while Arreola scored a third round stoppage of Israel Garcia. Williams is facing a much stiffer test tonight in the tough Verno Phillips, who made his professional debut back in 1988, when Williams was seven years old. Williams is also looking for his second world title in his second different weight class, as he is still currently the WBO Welterweight champion. Phillips picked up his second world title when he upset Cory Spinks for the IBF Junior Middleweight title in March of this year. Phillips has dropped that belt to pursue this fight for the WBO interim title and a fight on HBO. Phillips has rejuvenated his career with four straight victories including the upset over Spinks. Although Phillips has ten losses on his ledger, he was only stopped one time and that was in his fifth professional bout. Williams weighed in at 153.5 while Phillips came in at the junior middleweight limit of 154. Williams is a 9-1 favorite heading into the fight.

The opening bout of the televised portion of the card is the twelve round heavyweight attraction between Arreola and Walker. Arreola, the heavy favorite at 12-1, has come in heavy for the second straight fight weighing in at 254 while Walker has come in at a fit 231, the lightest he has ever been. Arreola is from nearby Riverside , California and will have the hometown crowd in his favor for tonight’s bout. The winner of this bout will become Wladimir Klitschko’s new IBF mandatory.

Also on the card tonight is a 2008 United States Olympian in East Los Angeles’ Shawn Estrada who is making his professional debut at junior middleweight against Lawrence Jones [2-1-1, KO] of Washington, D.C. Estrada weighed in at 163.5, while Jones came in at 159 for this scheduled four-round bout.

Also being featured tonight is Bakersfield , California ’s undefeated junior welterweight prospect Mike Dallas, Jr. [5-0, KO] in his first six rounder against Jose Alfredo Lugo [10-5, 5 KOs] of Los Mochis, Sinaloa, Mexico. Dallas was scheduled to take on Lugo twice before, with the most recent postponement being due to Dallas having surgery on his nose. Dallas weighed in at the 140 pound limit while Lugo came in light at 138.5.

Heavyweights Manuel Quezada [24-4, 15 KOs ] and Teke Oruh [ 14-1-1 , 6 KOs ] will do battle in the second fight of the night for Quezada’s WBC CABOFE heavyweight title. This is an interesting fight for many reasons, with one of them being that these two have been scheduled to fight each other on a number of occasions, but for one reason or another the fight never went off. Their bout was at one point going to be a headlining bout in San Jose , California until Oruh suffered an injury. This fight lives up to the slogan for tonight’s card of “At Last”, as we finally will get to see who the better heavyweight is. Quezada, who is out of Wasco , California weighed in 230 while Las Vegas , Nevada ’s Oruh weighed in at 249 for this scheduled ten round bout.

The opening bout of tonight’s show is a junior welterweight bout between Riverside , California ’s Josesito Lopez [22-3, 13 KOs ] and late substitution Alex Perez [23-31-4, 18 KOs ]. The scheduled eight-round attraction is Lopez’ first fight since his controversial majority decision loss to Edgar Santana on Showtime back in April, and is expected to be a bounce back fight for him. That was a bout in which Lopez dropped his opponent twice and still was given a raw deal on the scorecards. Lopez weighed in at 141.5 while Perez came in a half pound heavier at 142.

Tonight’s card is promoted by Goossen-Tutor Promotions and the televised portion of the card will begin at 7 PM Pacific time. The main event is scheduled to start around 8 PM .