Lucas Bahdi shocks hot prospect Ashton Sylve, scores brutal sixth-round KO

Lucas Bahdi upset one of boxing’s top young prospects, Ashton Sylve, scoring a chilling sixth-round knockout on the undercard of the Jake Paul-Michael Perry event on Saturday at the Amalie Arena in Tampa, Florida.

Prior to the stoppage, Bahdi (17-0, 15 KOs), an unheralded junior welterweight/welterweight from Niagra Falls, Canada, had been outclassed by the 20-year-old native of Long Beach, California. Sylve (11-1, 9 KOs) consistently made Bahdi miss using deft upper-body movement while beating the plodding 30-year-old to the punch. By the fifth round, Bahdi’s nose was a bloody mess and he appeared to be out of ideas as Sylve landed flush hooks, uppercuts, body shots and counterpunches at will.

However, the talented Californian tried to close the show in Round 6, applying hard pressure and opening up his offense to include three- and four-punch combinations for the first time in the one-sided fight, and that was all the opportunity Bahdi needed to turn the tables in shocking fashion.

With 35 seconds left in Round 6, Bahdi landed a jolting lead right and followed up with a head-swiveling right cross-left hook combination that instantly turned Sylve’s lights out. The young man fell face first to the canvas where he remained for a few very tense moments.

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Once Sylve was on his feet, and seemingly OK, Badhi was interviewed in the ring.

“Big thanks to my coach,” he told Ariel Helwani when asked how he turned the fight around after being dominated. “He told me it’s going to be tough in the beginning, but you’re going to get him. (Sylve) is very twitchy, very quick. I was trying to get to his body early on, but I was a little hesitant for some reason. It was tough to touch him in the beginning.”

And not so difficult once Sylve opened up offensively. It won’t be easy rebounding from a KO-of-the-Year candidate stoppage, but time is on Sylve’s side.

Sylve had been scheduled to face fellow young lightweight up-and-comer Floyd Schofield on the Mike Tyson-Jake Paul undercard before that event was postponed.

Now Bahdi could be in position to take on Schofield and test another hot prospect.

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