Jaron “Boots” Ennis and Eimantas Stanionis squared off on Saturday, April 12 at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City, NJ. The contest featured the IBF welterweight champion from Philadelphia, PA, up against the WBA 147-pound titleholder from Lithuania.
The scheduled 12-round world championship unification bout ended halfway through. “Boots” Ennis came out on top, defeating Stanionis via sixth-round RTD. The latter’s corner called it a day before the start of the seventh round to save their fighter from further punishment.
In the sixth round – and what turned out to be the final round – the representative of the host country scored a knockdown with a left body shot followed by a series of uppercuts.
With the victory, Jaron Ennis became a two-belt unified champion. The 27-year-old improved to 34-0 with 30 KOs and remained undefeated.
“The biggest part was just me having my fun, being myself and having a live body in front of me,” Jaron Ennis said. “When I got a live body in front of me, you I see what happened. I put on a show, I had my fun, I showed you speed power, defense. I showed you a little bit of inside game. I showed you everything. “I feel like I said when I got a live body in front of me it’s a whole different story. You are going to see a whole different ‘Boots’ and I’m going to keep taking it to the next level.”
“I finally was able to fight for the WBA [title], or fight for another title and take it from the man – and beat him,” said Ennis, who originally won the interim IBF welterweight title and was elevated to full IBF champion after Terence Crawford moved up a weight class. “That’s a blessing, and that’s everything I always wanted.”
Eimantas Stanionis didn’t succeed in his attempt to secure a second belt and lost his title. The 30-year-old dropped to 15-1, 9 KOs, suffering the first defeat of his career.