Photos: Sumio Yamada
In a major upset, middleweight Rob Brant (24-1, 16 KOs) dethroned WBA “regular” champion Ryota Murata (14-2, 11 KOs) by one-sided unanimous decision on Saturday night in front of 2,782 fans at the Park Theater at Park MGM in Las Vegas.
Brant threw a high volume of punches and connected often against Murata, whose face showed the damage. 2012 Olympic gold medalist Murata relied on power shots to try to get the knockout that never came. Scores were 118-110, 119-109, 119-109.
Brant threw an astounding 1,262 punches, landing 356. Murata, meanwhile, landed 180 of 774 punches.
“This is one of the best moments of my life,” Brant said. “I wasn’t thinking about punch output. I was thinking about winning.”
“This was a great middleweight championship fight,” said Top Rank CEO Bob Arum. “Both fighters showed tremendous heart. Congratulations to the new champion. He deserved the win.”
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