ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. -- Jeff Harding became the first Australian light heavyweight champion in history Saturday when he decked Dennis Andries twice and stopped him at 1:23 of the 12th round to capture the World Boxing Council 175-pound title.
Harding, who took the fight on five weeks notice, entered the final round trailing on all three judges' cards and needed a knockout. He twice dropped an exhausted 36-year-old Andries to improve to 15-0 with 12 knockouts.
Harding's face was smeared with his blood at the end. His left eye was cut in the first round and his nose bloody in the third. But the non-stop toe-to-toe action took its toll on Andries, who dropped to 34-8-2. Andries was making the first defense of the vacant title he won by stopping Tony Willis in February.
Harding, 24, took Andries' best punches early in the bout. He went down for the first time in his pro career in the fifth when he caught a grazing left hook while off balance. Referee Joe Cortez ruled it a knockdown but Harding was not hurt.
Late in the 11th, Andries wobbled in retreat to the ropes. At the start of the 12th, Andries flopped to the canvas twice from light barrages of punches. When he failed to defend himself following the second knockdown, Cortez halted the bout.
Andries, a native of Guyana who grew up in London and lives in Detroit, weighed 175 and Harding 174 1-2.
Harding, who replaced former champion Donny Lalonde after Lalonde abruptly retired from boxing May 28, is the stablemate of Australian WBC featherweight champion Jeff Fenech. Harding was the first Australian to fight for a 175-pound world title.
Fenech was at ringside at the Convention Center, cheering on his countryman who had never gone past 10 rounds before. Harding said he sensed he was behind entering the 12th round.
'I got the knockout,' he said. 'I was there to the end. The knockout came; that's boxing.'
Andries' trainer Emanuel Steward told him he was trailing entering the final round.
'I would've jabbed some more,' if he knew he was ahead, Andries said. 'I wasn't discouraged, I just kept throwing punches. Then I ran out of gas.'
