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Laila Ali set to box at The Garden

Another Ali will box at Madison Square Garden.

Laila Ali, the daughter of boxing great Muhammad Ali, will make her debut 35 years after her father lost to "Smokin" Joe Frazier at the Garden.

She'll be on the Nov. 11 undercard of the IBF heavyweight bout between champion Wladimir Klitschko and undefeated Calvin Brock. All three appeared at a news conference on Tuesday at Madison Square Garden.

Ali, the WBC light heavyweight champion, is 22-0 with 19 knockouts since her pro debut in 1999.

`excited'

"I'm excited to be at Madison Square Garden, the mecca of boxing," Ali said. "There's a lot of pressure being Ali's daughter, but I always try to do my best. I've got to do my thing -- he's already done his thing."

Ali's opponent will be determined soon.

"We just signed with this fight last week," said her adviser, Damon Bingham. "We're negotiating, we should know in a day or two."

Muhammad Ali attended his daughter's last fight in Berlin, where Laila Ali stopped Sweden's Asa Sandell in the fifth round on Dec. 17. Muhammad Ali, who at 64 is slowed by Parkinson's disease, walked ringside to kiss his daughter.

`sweet feeling'

He's proud that I won, even though he'd rather me not fight," she said of her father, who has attended more than half her fights. "He gets in the ring and gives me a kiss, it's a really sweet feeling."

It's possible the elder Ali will turn up at the Garden, where he dazzled crowds during his career. He lost the heavyweight crown to Frazier in a 15-round epic in 1971, but won the rematch three years later.

"It just depends on how he feels," she said. "He has his good days and bad days. He has a disease, so it's something that he deals with. But he's still traveling and getting around the world. People are always concerned about him. I don't have the energy to do as much as he does."
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