Answering the call to step up to the line when the main event was cancelled due to health reasons, lightweight sensation Floyd Schofield soundly defeated Haskell Rhodes by unanimous decision at the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas on Saturday, July 8.

Schofield, a native of Austin, was in total control during the early going, peppering his foe with jabs and scoring at will from all angles against a foe who had hardly any answers to his style.

Floyd Schofield (left) drops Haskell Rhodes – Photo courtesy of Golden Boy Boxing

The first six rounds of the scheduled ten-rounder were a solo performance by Schofield, who gradually settled into a routine of switching masterfully between orthodox and southpaw stances to deliver plenty of well-placed punches that kept his foe at bay during the early going.

Midway through the seventh round, a barrage of punches by Schofield sent Rhodes to the canvas in a heap, and he appeared out until he managed to make it to his feet, only to fall again under a hail of leather a few seconds later. Somehow, Rhodes survived the round to continue fighting, but he also went down in the eighth after a demolishing hook to the liver.

With six minutes to go in the fight, the 20-year old Schofield decided to use the final stretch to showcase his superb skills and excellent footwork, but was surprised at the very end of the ninth round by a headbutt that opened a ghastly cut on his left cheekbone.

Under intense pain but hardly any bleeding, Schofield scored sparingly from a safe distance in the final round just to put the finishing touches on a victory in which he checked all the boxes, scoring three knockdowns and surviving a nasty cut to earn a unanimous decision win.

The scorecards were 100-87 across the board for Schofield, who improved to 15-0 with 11 knockouts.

Rhodes slipped to 28-5-1 (13 KOs).

Schofield-Rhodes was promoted to main event of the night when the Vergil Ortiz-Eimantas Stanionis bout had to be cancelled due to health reasons related to an episode suffered by Ortiz two days before the fight.

Floyd Schofield (right) lands a jab on Haskell Rhodes – Photo courtesy of Golden Boy Boxing

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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