In the first ever female boxing contest at the Barclay’s Center, Brooklyn’s Heather “The Heat” Hardy (10-0, 2 KO’s) faced her toughest opponent to date in former world featherweight title challenger Jackie “The Force” Trivilino (9-8-3, 1 KO). The bout was an under card attraction on a seven fight card headlined by Ruslan Provodnikov’s light welterweight title defense against Chris Algieri.
The bout was a back-and-forth contest throughout, Trivilino being the busier fighter while Hardy, the UBF International super bantamweight champ, appeared to be the harder puncher. Hardy’s right eye had begun swelling in the second round and a head butt (there were a few) caused a cut to open on Hardy’s scalp that would ultimately lead to the contest being stopped.
Prior to the start of what would have been the final round, referee Pete Santiago called off the bout based on the scalp injury and went to the scorecards for the decision. Scores of 67-66 for Trivilino, 67-66 and 68-65 for Hardy gave “The Heat” her 10th victory via technical split decision. The crowd appeared to disagree with the outcome, as did Trivilino herself, at first thinking she had won by TKO.
Both fighters expressed interest in a rematch, though Hardy and trainer Devon Cormack did say that the decision was ultimately up to her manager and promoter. Trivilino, who has now lost three straight contests, said she’d like a second match to be on “neutral ground”, and not in or near Brooklyn.
Former WIBA champion Chevelle Hallback (29-8-2, 12 KO’s) returned to the ring in Tampa, Florida. The multi-division titlist fought for the first time in over two and a half years, scoring a second round knockout of Dominga Olivo (8-11-1), a former regional champ and world title challenger. Now 42 years old, Hallback held the featherweight and super featherweight titles for the WIBA as well as the IBA super featherweight and IFBA lightweight belts, but hasn’t held a championship since 2008. She lost back to back title challenges in 2011; both 10 round decisions to Cecilia Braekhus and Myriam Lamare before going in active. Oliva took this bout coming off five consecutive losses.
In Mexico, WBF light flyweight champion Ana Arrazola (20-9-2, 13 KO’s) fought a non-title contest Anely Hernandez (1-2), scoring a six round decision win. Arrazola won her title last August, and made one successful defense in November, winning a 10 round decision over Maria del Refugio Jimenez Cruz.
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