By Keith Idec

Jamel Herring made a successful super featherweight debut Friday night.

The former lightweight contender picked apart John Moralde and won a 10-round unanimous decision in Herring’s first fight at the 130-pound limit. The 32-year-old Jamel Herring (18-2, 10 KOs), a 2012 Olympian from Coram, New York, also won the vacant USBA super featherweight title in a bout ESPN televised as part of the Jose Ramirez-Antonio Orozco undercard from Save Mart Center in Fresno, California.

Herring, a former Marine, won all 10 rounds (100-90) on each of the three judges’ scorecards against the Philippines’ John Moralde (20-2, 10 KOs).

Herring hit Moralde with several right hooks early in the 10th round, but the taller southpaw couldn’t drop Moralde. A violent clash of heads with a little less than a minute remaining in the fight caused a nasty gash over Herring’s right eye.

In the fifth round, Herring kept pressuring Moralde, who seemed by that point to just try to survive.

The sixth, seventh, eighth and ninth rounds unfolded similarly, as Herring moved forward, scored points and prevented a fatigued, defensive Moralde from firing back with his activity.

Moralde obviously needed a knockout to win, but he appeared content to go the distance in a fight he clearly was losing.

Herring began battering Moralde to the head and body during the fourth round. Moralde nailed Herring with a straight right hand toward the end of the fourth, but Herring took it well and tapped his jaw to let Moralde know that shot didn’t affect him.

Herring connected with a right-left combination about a minute into the third round. Herring knocked Moralde off balance with a right hook later in the third.

Herring went to Moralde’s body early in the second round. He also landed a hard left uppercut at the midway point of that round.

Herring hit Moralde with a straight left hand that made Moralde smile with a little over a minute to go in the first round. An accidental clash of heads made referee Rudy Barragan check both boxers for cuts with about 40 seconds left in the opening round, but neither fighter suffered one.

Keith Idec is a senior writer/columnist for krikya360.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.