Burnside, Marchese win first K.O. titles
By Greg Gulas
YOUNGSTOWN — Kayla Burnside, a Struthers High student who is barely into her teenage years, has an advantage when it comes to training for her boxing matches.
Her father, Keith, is a noted area amateur and professional trainer and the person she credits with developing her punch, jab, hook and — most of all — stamina in preparing her for the ring.
On the other hand, Maria Marchese, a sophomore at Niles, is almost a veteran of boxing after her victory at the K.O. Drugs high school boxing tournament.
In action Friday at the ITAM Banquet Center, both girls won their fights, capturing the first two championship belts of this year’s competition.
Burnside defeated Destaney Phillips, who is home schooled, by TKO (27 seconds into the third round) to capture the heavyweight crown, while Marchese topped 2007 flyweight champ Katelyn Moore in the first-round to win her second consecutive featherweight title.
“I gravitated to the sport because of my dad,” said Burnside. “This was my first competition and having been around the sport, it was everything that I expected it to be.
“I worked my right hand and she [Phillips] kept looking at the floor so I just tried my uppercut,” she added.
Marchese, who won her second consecutive title, joined her brother Nick as two-time K.O. Drugs champions.
“I just needed to stay relaxed and keep my jab strong. My brother helped me tremendously last year and was an even bigger influence on me this year,” she said.
“With two titles now, I absolutely plan on being back next year to defend my crown,” she added.
In other female division action, Angell Lipps of Champion registered a split decision over Julianna Currier-Queen of Warren Harding in a lightweight bout; Shayla DeMar of Fitch stopped Nicci Beatty of Brookfield in a lightweight eliminator, and Stephanie Rosa of Like Skills Academy registered a victory by second-round TKO over Struthers’ Anna Perez in a cruiserweight fight.
In next Friday’s finals, DeMar will meet Currier-Queen and Lipps will take on Beatty.
“It was like I wrestled last week instead of boxing so I definitely needed to change my approach for tonight,” said Lipps. “Last week was a blur to me so I was happy to be much more focused. That was the big difference.”
DeMar (2-0) also had to make adjustments for her second fight.
“She [Beatty] put up a good fight but was shorter than me so that posed a big problem. I was trained to punch up so it was kind of tough punching down tonight,” said DeMar.
In underclass boys action, Tyler Smith of Fitch used his bell-to-bell punching technique to defeat Tu’Quan Rushton of Alpha Academy by unanimous decision, advancing to next week’s lightweight title fight against Jason Province of Lakeview.
Mardell Halas of Columbiana and Kyle Price of Canfield both won their bouts and will meet each other next week for the junior welterweight belt.
Smith, last year’s flyweight champion, ran his tournament record to 6-0 all-time with his win over Rushton. Halas, who defeated Craig Smith, and Price, who defeated Fitch’s Steve Tickerhoof, moved to 2-0 heading to the title round.
“I thought he [Rushton] had me in the first round but he couldn’t do anything on the ropes,” said Smith. “That’s when I felt I could make my move and did.”