NEWARK — Heavyweight prospect Kristian Prenga is the kind of puncher who only needs to be right once. Unfortunately for Christopher Arnold, it didn’t take very long for him to get it right.

The Albanian big man ended matters with a single right hand, dropping his smaller opponent and bringing the bout to a sudden halt at the 2:27 mark of their eight-rounded scheduled bout at the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J. 

The fight was highlighted the undercard of the inaugural Brick City Friday Night Fights card, a new series promoted by GH3 Promotions which is targeted 3-4 cards per year at the home of the NHL’s New Jersey Devils. Attendance for the card was announced as 4,651, with half of the venue curtained off.

Prenga, 32, of Edgewater, N.J. by way of Orosh, Albania has now won 11 straight since his lone defeat, a points loss to Giovanni Auriemma in the Netherlands. Prenga disputes the loss to the fighter whom he had previously stopped, saying that Auriemma had enticed him to a rematch in his home country, fought to survive and was handed a points win by the referee, who was the only judge of the fight.

Prenga, who is trained by Muhammad Abdul Salaam, brings a large contingent of Albanian fans to each of his fights.

The loss is the third straight – all by stoppage – for Arnold of Fredericksburg, Va.

Edwards repeats win over Lee

After two fights and two majority decisions, it was clear that Rickey Edwards was the wrong man for Michael Lee.

The skillful spoiler Edwards (14-5, 3 KOs) of Paterson scored a second straight upset win over Lee (10-3, 7 KOs) of Jersey City. One judge had the fight even at 57-57 while the other two scored it 59-55 and 58-56 for Edwards.

Photo by Carlo Estonactoc

From the opening bell it was clear that Edwards’ movement and jab was a puzzle that Lee would struggle to solve. Edwards controlled the opening round as Lee walked forward with a high guard but without a jab. Lee had his best success in round two when a right hand stunned Edwards momentarily, but Edwards returned to his boxing posture in round 3, landing consistently with his overhand right. Sensing the fight getting away from him, Lee began looking for one punch that could turn the fight around, but more often found himself playing catch-up as Edwards pot-shotted and evaded him.

The fight was the first for the 33-year-old Edwards since his first win over Lee in May of 2022, while the 28-year-old Lee sees his two-fight winning streak snapped.

As is often the case, Johns was the smaller fighter between the two, as he often has to fight larger opponents due to the dearth of lower weight fighters in the northeast region. The 30-year-old Johns last fought in September, losing a controversial majority decision to local fighter Misael Graffioli in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

Dwyke Flemmings Jr. had the most explosive performance of the early card. The middleweight from Paterson, N.J. turned out the lights on Luis Briceno (3-5, 3 KOs) with a single right hand, ending the fight just 45 seconds into the bout. The knockout punch proceeded a dismissive shrug from Briceno following a body punch.

Flemmings Jr., 20, has won all five of his bouts by knockout, but says this one was his most professional knockout.

“I took my time, I used my jab and set up a perfect punch and it worked,” said Flemmings, who is trained by his father Dwyke Flemmings Sr.

Flemmings, a 2018 USA Junior Olympics finalist, says the goal is to get at least seven fights in 2024 before targeting a minor title.

Anthony Johns (7-1, 5 KOs) showed there were no ill effects from his first defeat, walking down the overmatched Israel Camacho (2-10) to a four-round unanimous decision win in their junior bantamweight fight. Johns, a 2019 National Golden Gloves champion, earned a shutout decision by scores of 40-36 on all three cards.

John Vallejo kicked off the card with a workmanlike four-round unanimous decision over Rashad Bogar in a junior welterweight bout. Vallejo (5-0, 2 KOs), a southpaw from Paterson, N.J. boxed and picked his spots to flurry against Bogar (4-10-1, 2 KOs) of Newark, who was fighting for the first time since 2018.

Two judges scored it a 40-36 shutout while the third had it 39-37.

Ryan Songalia has written for ESPN, the New York Daily News, Rappler and The Guardian, and is part of the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism Class of 2020. He can be reached at [email protected].