CHICAGO — Ricardo Mayorga won the vacant WBC super welterweight championship Saturday night, unanimously outpointing former IBF welterweight champion Michele Piccirillo at the United Center on the Hasim Rahman-Monte Barrett undercard.
Mayorga (27-5-1, 22 KOs) had knockdowns in the second and fourth rounds but was unable to finish off Piccirillo (44-3, 28 KOs). By the end of the 11th, there were loud boos from the crowd.
Mayorga, a former WBC and WBA welterweight champion, was coming off an eighth-round TKO loss to Felix Trinidad in October. But that didn't stop him from saying Piccirillo was stupid for taking this fight or from calling Oscar De La Hoya and Fernando Vargas cowards during the week.
Also, former WBC heavyweight champion Oliver McCall, fighting in his hometown for the first time in 17 years, stopped Przemyslaw Saleta at 2:40 of the fourth round.
McCall (45-8, 32 KOs) landed a hard right and uppercut. A few more punches sent Saleta (42-7, 21 KOs) toward the ropes, where McCall connected with a left uppercut and a right, ending the fight.
"This is beautiful," McCall said. "I was setting him up for the uppercut all along. I let him get comfortable. I could have hit him with it, but I did not want him to start covering up."
McCall hadn't fought in Chicago since knocking out Bruce Johnson in the first round in 1998. He won the WBC championship from Lennox Lewis in 1994, but had a meltdown in the ring when they fought in 1997 — crying and refusing to throw a punch for two rounds before the bout was stopped. McCall has been in drug rehab, and his career has started and stopped several times.
"I am in my city with my friends and family, and this is a great night for me," he said.
In his first defense of the WBA welterweight championship, Luis Collazo (26-1, 12 KOs) scored a technical knockout of Miguel Angel Gonzalez (49-5-1, 39 KOs), when the former WBC champion's corner threw in the towel before the eighth round. The champion was relentless, staggering Gonzalez with blows to the head throughout the fight.
"It feels great to have defeated a ring legend, but there is a new star and it's me," said Collazo, who beat Jose Antonio Rivera in a unanimous decision for the belt in April. "It's my time now, and I want to conquer the whole division."
WBA interim super welterweight champion Alejandro Garcia (25-1, 23 KOs) won a unanimous 12-round decision over Luca Messi (28-6-1, 11 KOs).
"I had to dig down because my lethal weapon, the left punch, was not available," said Garcia, who thought he broke his left hand in the second round.
Robert Kamya (15-5, four KOs) won a majority decision over Alex Bunema (26-5-2, 12 KOs) for the WBC Continental Americas super welterweight championship.