Oleksandr Usyk Gets Away With Undeserved Victory vs. Rico Verhoeven in Shocking Result

The script was already written.

Oleksandr Usyk, legitimate heavyweight champion and consensus pick for best pound-for-pound fighter on Earth, would spend a few rounds finding footing against a kickboxer—however accomplished—in his second pro boxing match.

Then the gap in craft would announce itself, the end would arrive somewhere before the scheduled halfway point, and everyone would go home having enjoyed the Egyptian spectacle while only quietly acknowledging its inherent limitations.

Rico Verhoeven gets credit for the effort. Usyk retains his title. The sport moves on.

Nobody told Verhoeven.

What unfolded instead, across the middle rounds of a would-be showcase beside the pyramids, was something that shifted both the atmosphere in the desert and in front of screens around the world from mild curiosity to genuine disbelief.

The Dutchman was awkward, relentless, and entirely unbothered by the occasion. Usyk, meanwhile, was carrying a career-high 233.25 pounds and looking every ounce—heavy, sluggish, and unable to impose the kind of sustained technical authority that had made every previous heavyweight foe look overmatched.

And into the fight's final quarter, the vibe had shifted entirely.

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Holy cow. Is this really happening?

Where would the greatest upset in boxing history rank among all sports?

Right up until referee Mark Lyson became an infamous household name.

Usyk had no doubt seized control in the final minute of the 11th round. A desperate, explosive rally produced a right uppercut that sent Verhoeven pitching forward into the ropes for the fight's first knockdown. No rational mind would argue the Dutchman wasn't in real trouble.

But he got up.

And while it's true that what followed was a 12-punch combination from the champion, it's no less true that Verhoeven was still standing, still eluding shots, and precisely one second away from the bell—and a full minute on his corner stool—when Lyson wrenched himself between the fighters, waved his arms, and converted what could have been the most stunning result in the sport's history into an equally stunning controversy.

With one second left in the round.

One second.

Though breathtaking in its audacity, that's not even the complete picture.

Had Lyson's hair-trigger intervention not done the job, three co-conspirators at ringside were standing by with pencils. Judges Manuel Oliver Palomo and Fabian Guggenheim had the fight even through 10 rounds. Pasquale Procopio had given Verhoeven only six of those 10, meaning the two-point scoring margin attached to Usyk's knockdown would have put him ahead entering the final round regardless.

A fight Verhoeven was winning on two of three cards into the 11th would have been taken from him by arithmetic even if Lyson had kept his arms at his sides.

Reactionary referee or incompetent judges?

Pick your "because it's boxing" poison.

Usyk, in the in-ring aftermath, took a deep breath and changed the subject. Verhoeven, to his gracious credit, declined to pitch the well-deserved fit the moment invited, taking the high road instead. "It's not up to me," he said of the quick hook, which was accurate, infuriating, and far more dignified than the situation deserved.

Others, in post-fight chats with Bleacher Report, were less charitable.

Kevin Iole, a boxing hall of fame inductee and one of the sport's most respected voices, was unsparing.

"I thought it was a very poor stoppage," he said. "Yes, Verhoeven was hurt, but the ref had to know it was late in the round and Verhoeven was defending. I thought he deserved a chance to fight the 12th, and if he got hit a few big ones early, by all means stop it." On the scorecards, he added, "I had it 7-3 Verhoeven after 10. To me, the official scoring is wrong. Usyk gave a lot of rounds away. He was also stunned a couple of times."

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Randy Gordon, former chairman of the New York State Athletic Commission and also a hall of famer, was more brief but equally blunt.

"The stoppage was awful," he said. "A commissioner can't go undoing every questionable decision—but I'd sit him down for a while."

Sit him down. For a while.

When two Hall of Famers land in the same zip code on a controversy, it's worth paying attention.

Usyk retains his title. His record stays clean.

History, such as it is, will reflect a 25th consecutive victory.

But somewhere in the Netherlands, a kickboxer who came within a second of rewriting history is owed an apology that the sport of boxing—being the sport of boxing—will almost certainly never deliver.