Junior featherweight prospect Murodjon Akhmadaliev, a 2016 Olympic bronze medalist from Uzbekistan, will make his American television debut when he takes on Isaac Zarate on Nov. 24 at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, Main Events announced on Tuesday.
The scheduled 10-round fight will open the HBO-televised doubleheader (10 p.m. ET/PT) headlined by the previously announced fight between light heavyweight world titleholder Dmitry Bivol (14-0, 11 KOs), 27, of Russia, and former world champion Jean Pascal (33-5-1, 20 KOs), 36, of Laval, Quebec.
Akhmadaliev (4-0, 3 KOs), a 24-year-old southpaw who fights out of Brooklyn, New York, and trains in Indio, California, under the guidance of brothers Joel and Antonio Diaz, is on the fast track. The fight will already be his second scheduled 10-rounder since turning pro in March.
"It's been my dream to fight on HBO, where Roy Jones, Manny Pacquiao, and many other great fighters have fought. I can't believe that I'll have this opportunity," said Akhmadaliev, who got it in under the wire since the card will be the second to last on HBO before the network abandons boxing coverage at the end of the year. "Don't miss my fight. I'll bring the new drama show on HBO on Nov. 24th."
Akhmadaliev is co-managed by Vadim Kornilov, who sees him as another future top fighter in the line of others he has worked with, including Bivol and former junior welterweight world titlist Ruslan Provodnikov.
"We are very excited that Akhmadaliev will be featured with Dmitry Bivol's HBO appearance," Kornilov said. "This should be an exciting night of boxing. Akhmadaliev really knows how to get the fans out of their seats. I promise you'll be sorry if you miss this. His favorite fighters are Gennady 'GGG' Golovkin and Vasiliy Lomachenko, exceptional role models. He wants to become undisputed champion and a major star in his division in the first three years of his career. He is one to watch."
As an amateur, Akhmadaliev won silver medals at the 2012 and 2015 world amateur championships. After claiming the Olympic bronze medal, he finished his amateur career as a 2017 Asian Games gold medalist. He was 300-15 with 80 knockouts as an amateur.
Zarate (16-3-3, 2 KOs), 27, of San Pedro, California, is 4-0-1 in his past five fights and has never been stopped in his three defeats. Initially, Main Events and HBO were discussing Russian heavyweight Sergey Kuzmin (13-0, 10 KOs), 31, to appear in the Bivol-Pascal co-feature. But when they could not come up with an acceptable opponent they switched gears to focus on an Akhmadaliev fight.