Janibek Alimkhanuly wins by TKO on Crawford-Porter undercard

Boxing fans are going to want to remember the name Janibek Alimkhanuly.

The former amateur standout continued his trek toward a world title Saturday night at Michelob Ultra Arena, stopping former champion Hassan N’Dam in the eighth round on the undercard of the Terence Crawford-Shawn Porter WBO welterweight title fight.

Alimkhanuly started out by peppering N’Dam with straight left hands, almost a carbon copy of his dominant win over former 160-pound champion Rob Brant in Las Vegas in June. N’Dam repeatedly hung on the ropes and didn’t seem to have a plan.

Alimkhanuly hurt N’Dam in the third round with a combination and dropped him in the waning seconds. N’Dam beat the count and came out for the fourth round with a new approach, trying to stand in the pocket with Alimkhanuly and avoid his straight left hands.

But N’Dam continued to take a beating throughout the middle rounds, as the patient Alimkhanuly teed off at will.

N’Dam was repeatedly rocked, but ate most of the punches and continued to do just enough to keep referee Kenny Bayless or his corner from stopping the fight.

But Bayless had finally seen enough in the eighth, with Alimkhanuly snapping N’Dam’s head back against the ropes. He stopped the fight at 2:40 of the round, giving Alimkhanuly his fifth straight stoppage win.

The undefeated Kazakh, who goes by the nickname “Qazaq Style,” will be a tough out for anyone in the division.

“I am ready for a world title shot next,” he said. “‘Qazaq Style’ is about to take over the middleweight division. Any champion, it doesn’t matter.”

The co-main event between Esquiva Falcao and Patrice Volny ended in a technical decision win for Falcao.

Falcao was on the attack from the start, and Volny ended the first round with a high guard, trying to avoid taking punishment. But the Canadian clearly improved as the fight went on, getting closer to Falcao and landing heavy shots.

In the fifth, Volny had Falcao backed up as he unleashed at the end of the round and was starting to assert himself in the fight. But a nasty headbutt stopped the action near the end of the sixth, and Falcao was unable to continue.

Because the fight had gone more than four rounds, it went to the scorecards, and Falcao won a split decision, 58-57, 56-58, 58-56.

The fight was a title eliminator for the IBF middleweight title, currently held by Gennadiy Golovkin.

In the pay-per-view opener, lightweight prospect Raymond Muratalla won a fifth-round stoppage over Elias Damian Araujo.

Contact Jonah Dylan at jdylan@reviewjournal.com. Follow @TheJonahDylan on Twitter.