AMATEUR BOXING Buckeye Elks show pays tribute to area legendary trainer

The late Pedro Tomez was honored at the eight-bout card Saturday night.
By BOB ROTH
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
YOUNGSTOWN -- More than 200 boxing fans were on the second floor of the Buckeye Elks Saturday night to see an eight-bout amateur card, which honored the late Pedro Tomez, one of the area's legendary boxing trainers.
The card had the sanctioning of USA Boxing and the Lake Erie Association with Tom Miller of Mineral Ridge in charge of the activities.
Matchmaker for the card was Tom Cordell, with Pat Nelson and Frank West the promoters of an event called The 2001 Tomez Memorial Invitational Night of Boxing.
"Tomez believed in having bouts here for the community because we trained kids here," said West, who was at Tomez's side for many years training fighters at the Buckeye Elks.
After Tomez died in March 1988 at age 67, West continued to train fighters at the Buckeye Elks. His boxers won seven local Golden Gloves championships.
Former fighter: Tomez was also a standout fighter with 142 amateur bouts and 65 as a pro. He began training fighters at the old West Federal Street YMCA. Between there and the Buckeye Elks, in a 25 year span, his stable won 27 team titles locally and 10 more in the Cleveland Golden Gloves.
So for West Saturday's card was a dream come true and there were several outstanding bouts with five local boxers being victorious. There were six scheduled four-rounders and a pair of three-rounders.
An opening lightheavyweight bout was a slugfest that had Pittsburgh's Tommy Hazlip win a decision over Jeff Fox from Akron.
Then the local guys took over with Austintown heavyweight Chris Koval making his amateur record 4-0 when he stopped New Castle's Rich Becker in the first round with a shot to the body.
Two Jack Loew trained fighters, from the Southside Boxing Club, then put their wares on display as Billy Lyell and Durrell Richardson, a duo of 147-pounders, won decisions in crowd pleasing fights.
Richardson impresses: Richardson is a good moving southpaw who is the nephew of former world bantamweight champion Greg Richardson.
Lyell, a 17-year old, showed exceptional ring skill in a win over 31 year old Cory Van Meter from Akron.
The other two local wins went to Frank West-trained Buckeye Elks fighters. Both had the referee stop their contests as New Castle 178-pounder Anthony Pietrantonio won over Toledo's Brandon Greer at 43 seconds of the second round and Youngstown's 165-pound Joshua Harris had a victory at 1:04 of the first round when Bill Schaffer of Ellwood City couldn't continue.
The evening culminated when West presented a plaque to Daryl Tomez, Pedro's son.