Washington, DC (January 8, 2023)

By Ron Harris – According to Gervonta “Tank” Davis’s trainer, Calvin Ford, “This has been a rough training camp.”  That statement had nothing to do with boxing. Baltimore native, Davis, the World Boxing Association Light Weight Champion was arrested during training in Florida and spent some time in jail, according to reports from Parkland, Florida.  There was an alleged altercation with a female friend. 

Davis (28-0) put all of that aside and took care of his boxing business with a TKO of Dominican fighter Hector Garcia, who did not come out for the 9^th round.  “I was a little surprised he didn’t come out,” said Davis.  “But I knew he was hurt bad, but he’s a fighter and he didn’t want to show it.  I knew he was hurt though.”  

The fight started off very slow at the Capitol One Arena in downtown Washington, DC. in front of a sold out crowd of 19,731.    Both fighters took feeling each other out to the highest degree.  Fans could see Tank getting closer and closer to Garcia.  He still was not taking over the fight.  He missed several shots that barely missed taking Garcia’s head off.  Garcia was the taller fighter and punched down all night.  He landed some good shots to Davis’s head and body.  Nothing phased Davis as he went about his work to get closer to Garcia and started to bang away.  In the 8^th round, Davis finally caught Garcia with a hard left cross directly to the side of the head.  Garcia buckled and stumbled backwards.  Davis followed up with a 3-punch combination to the body and back to the head. 

That 3-punch combination was at the end of the round and may have done more damage than it seemed.   As Garcia (16-1) sat on his stool talking to his corner men, who waived over referee Earl Brown.  Brown then instantly waived an end to the fight.  “When I got the shot to my head in the final round, That’s when I could not see from my eye.” said Garcia.  “I didn’t know where I was when he hit me with that shot.  My vision is back but my head  still hurts. I couldn’t see from my right eye.  It was going well up to that point.  I was picking my shots.”

Davis continues to sell out NBA type arenas,  It’s amazing how people turn out to see a 5′ 5″ fighter that fights below 140 lbs.  It has happened too many times for it to be a fluke.

Davis says, “I was not throwing a lot of shots in the first 3 rounds because I was trying to beat him mentally. I was trying to trick him with my hands and my eyes and things like that because he is a tough fighter.  I had to bait him.”

Davis has a better knock out percentage than Mike Tyson had after 28 fights.  Tank is in the 90^th percentile of knocking out his opponents, Tyson was in the 80’s.  But Davis is a much more cerebral fighter than his knockout percentage would indicate.  Although he knocks out people, he moves well and sets up punches much better than he gets credit for.    Next is the fight, fans want to see in April.  Davis is all but signed to fight Ryan Garcia.  “God willing I’m ready for the fight with Ryan Garcia.”

On the local DC front, former world champion Lamont Peterson, got knocked out in his return to the ring after retiring 3 years ago.  Laurel’s Demond Nicholson went the distance but did not win a single round on the judge’s cards and lost a unanimous decision.  Other local winners included Travon Marshall, Keeshawn Williams and Jalii Hackett. 

Photo credit:  Amanda Westcott