Erickson Lubin had been slowly getting back into being a title contender after his knockout loss to Jermell Charlo a few years ago. In three fights last year Lubin scored wins over Ishe Smith, Zakaria Attou and Nathaniel Gallimore to work his way up to fighting tougher competition. On Saturday, he got one step closer to another title shot as he defeated former world title challenger Terrell Gausha by unanimous decision with scores of 118-110, 116-112, and 115-113 to improve his record to 23-1. Gausha fell to 21-2-1 with the loss, and he has a record of 1-1-1 his last three fights.

This bout did not have much activity from either fighter at the beginning as both were tentative to get their offense going. Lubin was looking for openings to land on Gausha, but those opportunities were few and far between as Gausha had a high guard to block shots from Lubin upstairs. No significant punches landed until the sixth round when Lubin connected with a couple of left hands upstairs. The action picked up in the eighth as Lubin backed up Gausha with left hands and followed that up with rights that landed in the ninth. He did get caught with a hard shot in the tenth round but it was not enough to swing the fight in Gausha’s favor. Lubin was able to finish out the fight with more activity over the last two rounds.

With the victory, Lubin solidifies himself as the top contender for the WBC super welterweight title. If he does get a shot, it may be a rematch with Jermell Charlo as he lost by first round knockout in 2017. Lubin feels that he has learned from the mistake in that fight and the experience that he gained over the past couple of years has him ready if he does get another chance, but did say that there were some things that he has to improve on after the win on Saturday.

“I give myself a B-minus,” Lubin said after the fight. “Gausha is a tough opponent, he’s real patient and I got carried away leading into the fight due to the trash talk between us two and I wanted to hurt him. I slacked on my defense a little bit.”

“That just goes to experience. I’m going to get right back in the gym and get ready for my title shot.”

He will have his eye on the battle between Charlo and Jeison Rosario on the 26th as he wants to be the first fighter to challenge the winner.

Cover photo by Ryan Hafey of Premier Boxing Champions