FLINT, Mich. — Claressa Shields wanted to make history on Friday night on multiple levels. The first part, she handled before she even stepped in the ring, headlining an all-women’s pay-per-view card.
The second, she took care of in the ring in a way similar to all of her fights before. Shields defeated Marie-Eve Dicaire by unanimous decision to become the first boxer in the four-belt era (since 2004), male or female, to be an undisputed champion in two divisions. Shields retained her WBC and WBO junior middleweight titles while claiming Dicaire’s IBF crown and the vacant WBA world title.
“I did it,” Shields said in the ring after the fight, which marked the first time in 20 years a women’s boxing match was the main event of a pay-per-view.
All three judges scored the fight 100-90, a clean sweep for the fighter who calls herself the greatest of all time. Shields landed 116 of 409 punches, and Dicaire landed 31 of 263. Shields landed double-digit punches in seven of the 10 rounds.
After the fight, Shields (11-0, 2 KO) was asked if she would drop to 147 pounds to fight against Katie Taylor. Shields laughed and complimented Taylor as a fighter.
“They got to pay me a lot of money to lose my butt to go down to 147,” Shields said, adding that she’d do it for a million dollars. Shields then called out Savannah Marshall, the one fighter who beat her as an amateur, and said Marshall is “scared of me.”
Fighting in her hometown, Shields, a two-time Olympic gold medalist, was dominant throughout against Dicaire (17-1). When she entered the ring, most of the 300-plus fans in the Dort Financial Center Arena stood with their camera phones out to register the event.
They stood for most of the bout, getting louder in the sixth and seventh rounds when Shields started to land more power punches. One of the punches staggered Dicaire early in the sixth, drawing cheers. After the fight, Shields said she was elbowed and head-butted a few times.
After the fight was over, Shields held all the belts in her arms and on her waist. She thanked the people in Flint after the fight and said that when she was a kid, “never in a million years” did she think she would be fighting a pay-per-view card in her hometown.
Shields said she will take a week to celebrate her birthday and then start training in Albuquerque, New Mexico, for her MMA debut in June.