Ogawa keeps Japanese 130lb belt

By Joe Koizumi
Photo by Boxing Beat

Hard-punching prospect, Japanese super-featherweight champ Kenichi Ogawa (19-1, 16 KOs), 129.75, kept his national belt when he stopped mandatory challenger Kento Matsushita (34-10-7, 13 KOs; formerly fighting under nom-de-guerre Kyohei Tamakoshi), 129.75, at 3:04 of the tenth and final round on Saturday in Tokyo, Japan. After a see-saw processing, Ogawa finally caught the veteran with a left hook following a right uppercut and decked him to the canvas with the referee declaring a TKO win for Ogawa, who successfully made his second defense since he dethroned Rikki Naito last December. The official tallies read after the ninth.

Matsushita pitifully failed in his sixth attempt to win the national belt though he once decked an upset third-round stoppage of Dante Jardon to win the WBC Youth 130-pound belt in Mexico in 2011.