SAN FRANCISCO – Liam Paro proved Saturday night that he is ready for championship-caliber competition.

The unbeaten Australian southpaw produced his most noteworthy win as a professional by stopping Montana Love in the sixth round of their high-stakes junior welterweight fight at Chase Center. Paro (24-0, 15 KOs) dropped his fellow southpaw twice during the sixth round and eventually caused referee Thomas Taylor to step between them and end their scheduled 10-rounder in DAZN Pay-Per-View’s co-feature before the 12-round main event between WBC super lightweight champ Regis Prograis and Devin Haney.

Cleveland’s Love (18-2-1, 9 KOs) was still on his feet when Taylor stopped the action at 1:49 of the sixth round. Their tactical fight lacked action and drew boos from the crowd before Paro abruptly ended it.

A straight left by Paro dropped Love barely 30 seconds into the sixth round. Love got up pretty quickly, but Paro drilled him with another left hand that knocked a stunned Love flat on his back with just over 50 seconds remaining in the sixth round.

Love got up again and tried to fight out of the trouble. Paro landed several additional flush punches, though, and Taylor decided Love shouldn’t continue.

A straight left by Paro landed flush with approximately 25 seconds on the clock in the fifth round. Paro landed a jab that backed up Love with just under a minute to go in the fifth round.

Taylor stopped the bout briefly late in the fourth round to sternly warn Paro for continually hitting Love on the back of his had. Paro and Love became entangled and fell to the canvas together with just under 40 seconds remaining in the third round.

A straight left by Paro landed just before the midway mark of the third round. Fans booed in the opening minute of the third round and again during the final minute of it due to a lack of action.

A straight left by Paro landed with about 40 seconds on the clock in the second round. Paro’s right hook connected earlier, less than 20 seconds into the second round.

A right hook by Love forced Paro to clinch in the middle minute of an opening round in which there wasn’t otherwise much action.

Love, 28, fought for the first time in the almost 13 months since he was disqualified during the sixth round against Australia’s Steve Spark for flipping Spark over the top rope.

Spark dropped Love in the second round of that November 2022 bout at Rocket Mortgage FieldHouse in Cleveland. Love later suffered a cut from an accidental clash of heads early in the sixth round of a very competitive fight he led on only one scorecard (48-46, 47-47, 47-47).

Paro, 27, ended an even longer layoff than Love on Saturday night, nearly 14 months.

He was scheduled to challenge Prograis on June 17 at Smoothie Center in New Orleans, Prograis’ hometown. Paro suffered a slight tear to his left Achilles tendon during a sparring session, though, which forced him to pull out of that championship match early in May.

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