Chavez Shocks Taylor : Boxing: Behind on points, he scores a knockout with two seconds remaining in the final round. Referee comes under fire.

LAS VEGAS —  World Boxing Council champion Julio Cesar Chavez, behind on points, stopped International Boxing Federation champion Meldrick Taylor with two seconds left in a junior welterweight title fight at the Las Vegas Hilton Saturday night.

Referee Richard Steele stopped the fight at 2:58 of the 12th and final round after Chavez (69-0) threw a short, chopping right that caught Taylor on the chin and dumped him.

Chavez, who had several rocky moments in the middle and late rounds, seemed briefly in trouble himself late in the 12th. In fact, with 48 seconds left, Taylor tagged Chavez with two left hooks and backed him up.

But in the waning seconds, Taylor, who was bleeding from the mouth, nose and whose left eye was half-closed, tumbled to the floor, groping awkwardly for the bottom ropes. With that, about half the 9,130 in the Hilton Center pavilion, Chavez’s Mexican fans, were on their feet.

Taylor was up at the count of six, then Steele finished the mandatory eight-count. He looked into Taylor’s eyes, asked him if he could continue and, after receiving no response, signaled the end of the fight.

That prompted Taylor’s 70-year-old trainer, Lou Duva, to climb through the ropes in rage.

After 11 rounds, two of the three judges had Taylor far ahead. Jerry Roth had it 108-101 and Dave Moretti 107-102, both for Taylor. Judge Chuck Giampa had Chavez ahead, 105-104.

Many ringside reporters had Taylor ahead, by one to three points. One Times card had Chavez ahead, 105-104; another had Taylor, 106-103.

One thing seemed certain. Chavez certainly looked like the winner. He was unmarked, save for a nick on the side of his nose.

Taylor was a mess. He had bled from his mouth throughout the fight, his left eye was steadily closing after the middle rounds and his nose began to bleed late in the fight. After the fight, he skipped the news conference and was taken to a nearby hospital and treated for dehydration.

Chavez indicated two judges should have gone with him and had their eyes checked.

“Those two who had me behind so far, I think they are blind,” he said through an interpreter. “It was a close, even fight, and if they had me behind one or two points, that’s OK--but not seven points.

“He was faster, stronger than I was, but I had more heart. Mr. Steele did the right thing. That’s how accidents happen in boxing, letting fighters who are hurt keep fighting.”

Steele, who was working his 70th world title fight and who is considered one of America’s top referees, said Taylor had had it, that it didn’t matter if two seconds or two minutes were left.

“I asked him if he was OK, and I got no response,” Steele said. “I looked into his eyes and saw a young man who’d fought his heart out and who had had enough. I was not going to let him take one more punch.”

But with only two seconds to go, Duva’s people protested, Chavez couldn’t have gone across the ring in time to land another punch. Had Steele let two seconds elapse, Taylor, not Chavez, would today own two pieces of the world junior-welterweight championship and would be listening to multimillion-dollar offers to fight Hector Camacho at the Mirage.

Did Steele know how much time was left? Each corner of a boxing ring has an elevated red light--a blinking red light in the case of Nevada--that signals 10 seconds are left in a round.

From where Steele stood, looking into Taylor’s eyes, the red light was blinking over Taylor’s shoulder. Steele said he never saw the red light, only Taylor’s eyes.

Chavez and Taylor (now 24-1-1) took a round to rev up, and it seemed as if a one-punch ringside fight minutes before Chavez entered the ring between Camacho and promoter Don King’s son, Carl King, might top the main event. The two had words, Camacho punched him in the head, then ran away.

But what unfolded after that was a fight fought with an intensity seldom seen in a matchup of two world-class boxers.

In the fifth round, Taylor started with a combination that rocked Chavez, and made him back up. It might have been, at that point in the fight, the hardest anyone had ever hit Chavez.

But seconds later, Chavez came back with a short right uppercut that staggered Taylor. For most of the round, they leaned on each other at center ring, and swapped their best blows.

Taylor, probably due to his closing left eye, was getting tagged frequently by hard, crisp shots and on each occasion came back with combinations of his own. But many of Taylor’s punches late in the fight were soft, the power gone.

The 10th was unforgettable. Taylor’s mouth and nose bled freely, and his blood ran down Chavez’s shoulders and arms.

Eighteen seconds into the last round, Chavez started Taylor off with a stiff right hand that rocked the Philadelphian. He staggered Taylor with a left-right combination shortly before the right hand came that ended the fight.

Ironically, Taylor built up a lead on two cards by doing the one thing his trainers ordered him to do, to stay away from the ropes, where Chavez is most effective. Only a few times did Taylor allow Chavez to back him up to the ropes, but on the last such occasion, he won the fight with one punch.