Shakur Stevenson Headlines For Top Rank Saturday

Tonight in Las Vegas rising star and former WBO Featherweight champ, Shakur Stevenson is back in a Super Featherweight, non-title main event looking for a world title shot late in 2021.

The 15-0 Newark, NJ native Stevenson gets set for his third straight post-Covid 19 pandemic headline, but this time for the first time with some fans at the Virgin Hotel on the Vegas strip. That’s when he faces 21-1 Jeremiah Nakathila of Namibia,

Just about that time ⏳

Back to full capacity tonight in Las Vegas 😎

🥊 #StevensonNakathila
ESPN+ Undercard – 6:30pm ET / 3:30pm PT
ESPN Main Card – 10pm ET / 7pm PT pic.twitter.com/FDx6XKl4I2

— Top Rank Boxing (@trboxing) June 12, 2021

We discussed more about this battle for Stevenson and what his future might hold on the Big Fight Weekend Podcast, you can hear more by clicking here below,

As for the underdog in the main event, our Marquis Johns wrote for us earlier in the week,

the challenger Nakathila (21-1, 17 KOs) has been waiting for a shot at the 130 title for a long time. Pandemic aside, Nakathiilia has waited at least over 2 years for a title fight to come to fruition. He also comes into this battle with Stevenson winning his last 10 fights by stoppage, but will be making his US debut Saturday night and is huge underdog to Stevenson.

I hope this is the last of these stay-busy fights for Stevenson. Thankfully, if he is victorious, the WBO will help that out. Current titleholder Jamel Herring would be next in line for the winner of this one and what would hopefully lead to a unification bout with current WBC champion Oscar Valdez in 2022. Both Herring and Stevenson have been angling for fights with Valdez but he is slated in his own stay-busy defense against Robson Conceicao in September.

“I just feel like, when I’m at my best, it doesn’t matter who the opponent is. It’s been like that my whole career since I’ve been an amateur. You don’t know who you’re going to fight in the amateurs. You come up and you just gotta fight people,” Stevenson said on Thursday. 

“It feels good knowing that Bob thinks I’m the next superstar of the sport, and I have to live up to the hype.”

This fight is talior-made for this to happen for Stevenson, who vacated the WBO Featherweight belt last Summer, to deliver. And, I think he will in what should hopefully lead to a higher profile matchup after Saturday night.

Now, we wait to see if Stevenson will deliver, even spectacularly, in his latest chance.