BROOKLYN, New York – Gervonta “Tank” Davis sustained the first blemish on his professional record, settling for an unpopular draw on Saturday night here at Barclays Center.

One judge scored the fight for Davis at 115-113, while the other two had it 114-114 even, resulting in a majority draw. The crowd – a reported 19,250 – lustily  booed the decision.

With the draw, Davis, 30-0-1 (28 KOs), retained his WBA lightweight title, while Roach, 25-1-2 (10 KOs), earned a significant amount of esteem, even if he didn’t become a two-division champion on this night.

“I’m a little disappointed in the decision. I thought I pulled it out,” said Roach, whose WBA junior lightweight title wasn’t at stake.

“That’s what two skilled fighters do – go in there and show off their craft. I definitely thought I won, but we can run it back.”

Davis, too, thought he should have won.

“I think I pulled it out in the last three rounds, for sure,” he said. “I was catching him with some clean shots. I feel I was breaking him down as the rounds were going on, but he kept coming, so I didn’t want to make mistakes and I kept it cautious.”

CompuBox stats told the story of the 29-year-old Roach outworking Davis over the 12-round distance, with Roach landing 112 of 400 total punches, while Davis landed 103 of his 279 attempts. Davis had a slight edge in power connects, landing 93 of 210 attempts, while Roach landed 87 of 252 attempts.

The most consequential sequence of the fight wasn’t any punch, but rather a decision by referee Steve Willis. Seconds into Round 7, Davis took a knee after absorbing a jab from Roach, then ran over to the corner to have a cornerman wipe his face, an action that he later explained was because he had chemicals from his hair dripping into his face. Willis began to count a knockdown, reaching two before changing his mind and allowing Davis to be illegally tended to by his cornerman. Had Willis correctly called that a knockdown – or penalized Davis’ corner for interfering in the middle of the round – judges could have scored the round 10-8 in Roach’s favor, giving the prohibitive underdog the margin of victory.

“It should have been a knockdown,” Roach said. “If that was a knockdown, I win the fight. He’s saying grease got in his eye, but if he takes a knee and the ref starts counting, it should be a knockdown.”

Davis’ explanation seemed to upset the crowd further, as they booed him once more.

“It’s all cool,” Davis said. “They love you, then they hate you. Then they love you again. You know what I mean?”

Terence Crawford was among the boxing personalities who chimed in on the fight, stating that he felt Roach was robbed of a deserved victory.

“I never seen someone take a knee and they don’t count it as a knock down,” Terence Crawford chimed in on social media.

It was clear from the outset that both fighters, who had fought each other twice as young amateurs, had a great deal of respect for one another, as neither seemed to want to take any chances at walking into a counterpunch. Davis, 30, of Baltimore, began to pick up his activity slightly in the second round, leading with 1-2 counters as Roach maintained his steady, disciplined pressure, which made Davis work but gave him little off which to counter.

Roach made his first significant statement of the fight in the third, landing with both hands to the body before landing a right around the guard.

Davis stepped up his work rate in the fourth, getting off with 1-2 combinations as he sought to convince Roach to take more chances. Davis’ best offense of the round came when he shoulder-butted Roach, which drew a retaliation right hand to the face from Roach. Willis warned Roach for the infraction, even though it was Davis who committed the foul.

The fifth round saw both fighters step up the intensity a little more as Davis began to find the target with double left hands and Roach backed straight out of exchanges.

Anyone doubting whether Roach was a serious threat to pull off the upset would have been convinced by the seventh round, when Roach appeared to hurt Davis with a counter right hand that landed awkwardly on the right side of Davis’ face as he attempted to turn away from the shot. Roach wobbled Davis momentarily, but he continued to be disciplined in his approach, having noted the long list of fighters who were knocked out by Davis as they attempted to capitalize on an advantage.

Roach continued to find success in the eighth round, as the two exchanged their rear power hands, with the right hand of Roach doing more damage than the left of the southpaw Davis.

After the chaos of the ninth round, Roach continued to put on smart pressure, putting his punches together to the body and head while Davis mostly settled for one punch at a time.

With the fight potentially in the balance, it was Roach who came out aggressively with combinations while Davis continued to look for that single shot.

Afterwards, Davis gave his respect to Roach, whom he defeated in those two amateur bouts but now has to settle for drawing with in the pros.

“Lamont is a great fighter. He got the skills, like I said before, and the punching power,” Davis said. “It was a lesson learned. Shout out to Lamont Roach and his whole team. Hopefully we can run it back in New York. Let’s do it again, baby!”

Roach, who seemed to revel in the vindication of his showing, agreed that the fighters have unfinished business.

“Gervonta is a great fighter,” Roach said. “I thank him for the opportunity to show all the people that were doubting me, all the fake boxing media and fans talking shit. That shit got flipped upside down. Even though I didn’t win tonight, I thought I did. But it’s a win for me in my book – but we are not satisfied with that. We need a real W.”

Ryan Songalia is a reporter and editor for BoxingScene.com and has written for ESPN, the New York Daily News, Rappler, The Guardian, Vice and The Ring magazine. He holds a Master’s degree in Journalism from the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism and is a member of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be reached at ryansongalia@gmail.com or on Twitter at @ryansongalia.