World-ranked Connor “The Kid” Coyle battled to a majority draw with Vito Mielnicki, Jr. at Madison Square Garden last Friday night after a back-and-forth 10 rounder for the vacant WBC, USBA and WBO international belts.
One of the three judges, Tom Carusone, scored it 96-94, for Mielnicki, a 22-year-old rising star out of Roseland, New Jersey. The other two officials, Ken Ezzo and Kevin Morgan, both had it a 95-95 draw.
There were no knockdowns, but Coyle left the ring with a cut over his left eye that required seven stitches. The three titles remain vacant, amid speculation over a rematch.
“There has been a mention of a rematch possibly in June,” Coyle, who’s 34 and ranked #3 by the World Boxing Association [WBA], told the Echo. “But everything has to be right for the rematch. If it is to happen, it will be more likely June this year back at MSG.”
Both fighters had their moments before a capacity crowd of 4,979 at The Theater at Madison Square Garden with Mielnicki, making his middleweight debut after moving up a division, taking the initiative in the first two rounds. He landed a big right in the second round and had Coyle back-pedaling.
The Derryman, however, came on strong in the third stanza with some good combination punching to decisively win the round.
Coyle suffered a cut above his left eye, from what appeared to be a right uppercut in the fourth heat, but with the quicker hands and superior combinations, he would dominate that heat, and the next several rounds.
Yet Mielnicki would seemingly catch a second wind and rally in the seventh, bloodying Coyle’s nose with an uppercut. Still, Ireland’s top world middleweight contender wast to weather the offensive and counter with a big uppercut at one point.
The next couple of rounds were close. They’d exchange hard leather with Coyle counter punching well. But Mielnicki, 12 years Coyle’s junior appeared to the busier man in the 10th and final stanza, albeit Coyle would land the last two solid punches in the round – a left and a right.
Although still undefeated, Coyle [21-0-1, 9 KOs] would dispute the official result that left Mielnicki [20-1-1, 12 KOs] with a draw to go with the lone loss on his ledger.
“I thought I did enough to win the fight. I thought he should have been deducted a couple of rounds at least for the low blows and shots to the back of the head and stuff like that --- I felt the referee didn’t do me any favors and they were looking out for him. There should have been a few points deduction for him,” he said.
Still, he had props for his young foe, particularly his strength. “I was surprised that [since] he was coming up from light middleweight, that I’d be the bigger, stronger guy. But he surprised me with his strength. He had a good chin, I hit him some hard shots, right hands, left hooks to the chin and he took them well.”
On what he could have done different, Coyle said: “I felt ok in the fight, I felt I put together some combinations together – but I could have let a lot more go. I could have done much better myself. I could have started faster and I could have finished better, but [I’m] a work in progress. If we do get the rematch, I’ll know what I’ll have to do in the next fight.”
