Another weekend of action on the women’s boxing front saw a number of divisions making the case for a divisional Top 10, given the amount of fighters active at the weight and their stellar performances.

One of such divisions is junior flyweight, where Argentina’s Leonela Yudica finally clawed her way back to the Top 5 after a hard-fought win over her vastly underrated compatriot Tamara DeMarco. The taller, stronger and more experienced Yudica had her hands full and finally came on top thanks to a narrow decision that was deemed good enough by the panel to put her back in our junior flyweight ratings at No. 5.

“Yudica is 34 years old and is now debuting in this new category, and her performance was really good,” said Argentine writer and TV producer Yesica Palmetta, who has followed Yudica’s career closely. “Demarco is a warrior with lots of technique, and they both showed off their best talents.”

Historian Malissa Smith replied that “it is nice to see Yudica climbing back up the ladder with her well-fought bout against a very worthy opponent. Both Yudica and DeMarco exhibited elite skills as they parried back and forth across their very close ten-round battle.”
A little bit higher in the weight chart, the welterweight division had to be rearranged completely after a few fighters were found to be inactive at the weight for a while, namely Victoria Bustos and Layla McCarter. They were both dropped out and a new lineup was introduced in the bottom three, with Ivana Habazin, Marie Pier Houle and former amateur star Oshae Jones taking those spots.
Columnist Mark Jones was the sole voice of dissent when he said that “I’d rather rank Kandy Wyatt at No. 5 than Jones. She’s at least fought ten rounds,” but he was overruled by the majority who agreed with Smith when she expressed that “I like Oshae Jones and think she will do great things in the sport.”

Diego M. Morilla writes for The Ring since 2013. He has also written for HBO.com, ESPN.com and many other magazines, websites, newspapers and outlets since 1993. He is a full member of the Boxing Writers Association of America and an elector for the International Boxing Hall of Fame. He has won two first-place awards in the BWAA’s annual writing contest, and he is the moderator of The Ring’s Women’s Ratings Panel. He served as copy editor for the second era of The Ring en Español (2018-2020) and is currently a writer and editor for RingTV.com.

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