Klitschko Gets Hurt, but He Wins Decision

Wladimir Klitschko was knocked down and ended the fight bleeding on his stool. He looked anything but a winner, but the scorecards said otherwise.

Klitschko won a split decision over DaVarryl Williamson after the heavyweight bout was stopped at the end of the fifth round because of a head butt Saturday night at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas.

The ring doctor ruled Klitschko was bleeding too badly to continue, but the decision went to the ringside scorecards because the butt was unintentional.

Klitschko was coming back after being stopped in the fifth round of his last fight, against Lamon Brewster. He was hurt when Williamson threw a right hand that dropped him to one knee in the fourth round.

That was one of the few punches landed by Williamson, who lost four of the five rounds on two scorecards. Two judges had Klitschko winning, 49-46, while the third had Williamson ahead, 48-47.

Klitschko (43-3) was bleeding from a cut on his left eye in the fourth round, and blood was pouring out of a cut above his right eye after the head butt in the closing seconds of the fifth round. But Williamson (20-3) stayed away from him most of the fight.

On the undercard, Jeff Lacy (17-0) became the first member of the 2000 U.S. Olympic boxing team to win a pro title when he stopped Syd Vanderpool (35-3) at 1:37 of the eighth round to win the International Boxing Federation super-middleweight championship. And Kassim Ouma (20-1-1) won the IBF junior-middleweight title with a unanimous decision over Verno Phillips (38-9-1).

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Steve Forbes, connecting consistently with jabs and hooks, won a split decision over Steve Quinonez in a super-lightweight bout Friday night at the Trump 29 Casino in Coachella.

Forbes (24-3) outpointed Quinonez (30-9-1), 96-94, on two judges’ cards, while the third gave the fight to Quinonez, 96-95.