Saturday night’s rematch between Deontay Wilder and Bermane Stiverne wasn a match that the fans wanted to see. It also wasn’t a matchup that Wilder particularly wanted to see.
But he did want to prove a point, and Wilder (39-0, 38 KO) proved it. The first time they met, in 2015, Stiverne (25-3-1, 21 KO) was able to go the 12-round distance with Wilder. This time, Wilder wanted to end things emphatically.
With three first round knockdowns, Wilder demolished his rival and made for a nice 76-second highlight reel, as you can see above.
After the fight, Wilder called out fellow heavyweight titleholder Anthony Joshua (20-0, 20 KO), but we’ll have to see what’s next. There’s been talk of him facing Dillian Whyte before getting to AJ, and Dominic Breazeale won a WBC eliminator last night over Eric Molina, too, so just a couple of hours before taking care of one mandatory challenger, Wilder already had another in place.
We’ll have to see what comes next, and in 2018 overall, but this was a savage end to 2017 for Wilder.