Heavyweight Jared Anderson to fight Marios Kollias in ‘tune-up fight’ February 14

Top Rank heavyweight Jared Anderson is set to return from his first professional loss on February 14 against Greece’s Marios Kollias at New York’s Madison Square Garden, an official connected to the negotiations told BoxingScene on Monday.

The main event of the Valentine’s Day card will be Keyshawn Davis’ attempt to claim the World Boxing Organization lightweight title from new belt holder Denys Berinchyk. Anderson, 17-1 (15 KOs), is coming off a humbling knockout defeat at the hands of Martin Bakole on August 3 in Los Angeles.

Kongo’s Bakole, 21-1 (16 KOs), battered Anderson, knocking him down once in the first round and twice more in the decisive fifth round, when he notched the stoppage.

Anderson, of Toledo, Ohio, was advised against taking the rugged test against Bakole – whose style has drawn comparisons to that of George Foreman – but the lucrative purse he collected from Saudi Arabia’s Turki Alalshikh convinced him otherwise.

In Kollias, 12-3-1 (10 KOs), Anderson will meet a 33-year-old from Sweden who is coming off two bouts in 2024, including a majority decision loss to Kem Ljungquist in March.

One official described the Kollias bout as “a tune-up fight” for Anderson following his brutal August defeat.

Top Rank is expected to formally announce Anderson–Kollias in the near future, though the official connected to the deal who spoke to BoxingScene said each fighter has already signed.

Lance Pugmire is BoxingScene’s senior U.S. writer and an assistant producer for ProBox TV. Pugmire has covered boxing since the early 2000s, first at the Los Angeles Times and then at The Athletic and USA Today. He won the Boxing Writers’ Association of America’s Nat Fleischer Award in 2022 for career excellence.