By: Sean Crose
Rising welterweight Eimantas Stanionis continued with his winning ways on Wednesday as the 18-0 Oxnard – by way of Lithuania – based fighter grinded down and ultimately stopped the 19-4 Justin De Loach in the ninth round of a scheduled ten round fight. The 26 year old Stanionis was able to earn the win without having his trainer, Marvin Somodio, in his corner. Famed trainer Freddie Roach stepped in to replace Somodio, however, which proved to be a wise decision on the part of team Stanionis.
De Loach wasn’t the kind of fighter to simply be rolled over. Ultimately, however, Stanionis was just too much of moving force for the 26 year old Georgia native to handle.
Earlier in the Fox Sports 1 broadcast, the 16-0-1 super welterweight Kent Cruz knocked out the 9-2 Erik Castillo in the second round. The Ronnie Shields trained fighter hadn’t been in the ring since early 2019. Ring rust, however, clearly wasn’t an issue.
The 16-0 Chordale Booker also appeared on the card, besting the 11-1-2 Sanny Duversonne by split decision in their eight round super welterweight affair. Booker, of Stanford, Connecticut, had his work cut out for him against Florida’s Duversonne, finding himself outskilled at times and even finding himself in danger in the seventh round.
The entire card went down at LA’s Microsoft Theater.