This Saturday, November 19th, the T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas, Nevada hosts HBO PPV’s latest offering as Sergey Kovalev faces Andre Ward with Kovalev’s WBA, WBO and IBF world titles at 175 pounds on the line. With the fight less than 48 hours away, Andre Ward is coming in a slight -135 favorite over Kovalev, who is returning at +115. The over/under for the 12-round title bout is set at 9 1/2, with the over paying -235 and the under paying +195. Ward is undefeated as a pro at 30-0 and he is the last American male to win an Olympic gold medal in boxing, back in 2004. The lore around this guy is that he has not lost a fight since he was a teenager, and as a 168 pounder five years ago, he cleaned out the super middleweight division and was considered one of the best pound for pound fighters out there. That was five years ago however, and he has been largely inactive due to contract issues and injuries. He enters the fray in the light heavyweight division now at 32 years old, and he is looking to make up for lost time and opportunity. More than a year ago, Ward stated he was moving up to fight Kovalev, which was seen as a major challenge. Kovalev enters the fight undefeated at 30-0-1, with his lone blemish coming via technical draw back in 2011 in the second round of an eight round bout. In August of 2013 he went to England and took the WBO world title from Nathan Cleverly. Since then, he has bludgeoned just about everyone they put in front of him, and he has been calling for a major fight and payday for a long time,. His original target of WBC titleholder Adonis Stevenson never worked out after ugly negotiations extended themseves over the last few years. When Ward stepped up to the new weight class, Kovalev never waivered in accepteing the fight, and word is that the “Krusher” cannot believe that he is the underdog heading in. Let’s see how mean that makes Kovalev come fight time. The live event in Las Vegas is at the T-Mobile Arena and features 10 fights in all. Below are the rest of the available lines for the event. Of special note is the women’s four round bout that sees 22-year old two-time Olympic Gold Medalist Claressa Shields making her professional debut. Light Heavyweight 10 rounds – Oleksandr Gvozdyk -185 o9½ -425 Isaac Chilemba +155 u9½ +320 Middleweight 10 rounds – James De La Rosa +1000 Curtis Stevens -1750 Super Lightweight 10 rounds – Darleys Perez +365 o8½ -190 Maurice Hooker -505 u8½ +150 Super Middleweight 4 rounds – Franchon Crews +1300 Claressa Shields -3000
