NEW YORK – Abdullah Mason didn’t suffer a single knockdown in any of his first 94 amateur and professional fights combined.

The elite lightweight prospect knew, however, that he would respond appropriately once an opponent hit him hard enough to cause one. His father and trainer, Valient Mason, has helped the 20-year-old Cleveland native prepare for such trying times since he entered the gym as a 9-year-old who had no idea whether he would even stick with boxing, let alone allow it to consume him.

It thus came as no surprise to Abdullah or Valiant that one of boxing’s most tantalizing talents took Yohan Vasquez’s most punishing punches, got off the canvas not once, but twice, and knocked out the dangerous Dominican veteran in the second round of their brief, enthralling slugfest November 8 in Norfolk, Virginia.

Vasquez (26-6, 21 KOs) dropped Mason twice with left hooks – the first time only 48 seconds into their scheduled 10-rounder and again 1:10 later. Mason’s picturesque left uppercut knocked Vasquez flat on his back between those two first-round knockdowns, with 1:39 to go in the opening round.

After an unforgettable first three minutes of action, Mason drilled Vasquez with a left to the body that sent him to one knee during the second round. Referee Brent Bovell stopped his count at eight because he sensed a temporarily immobilized Vasquez wouldn’t be able to get up in time to beat the count.

“I didn’t panic at all when he hit me like that,” Mason told The Ring. “But I would say the fight sped up really quickly, so everything was going super fast. But I was definitely ready for it. I wasn’t in panic mode or frantic or anything like that. Everything was calm and it was still calculated, the way we had trained for it. You know, so I caught him with the same punch that we’ve been working on. But the whole fight went so quickly. It just went so quickly.”

Mason (16-0, 14 KOs) will fight for the first time Friday night since his incredible comeback from two first-round knockdowns three months ago at Scope Arena.

He will face Manuel Jaimes in an eight-round bout on the Denys Berinchyk-Keyshawn Davis undercard at Madison Square Garden’s Theater.

The Mason-Jaimes match is scheduled to start at approximately 7:30 p.m. ET on the streamed portion of the show. The action is set to shift from ESPN+ to ESPN at 9 p.m. ET, when the three-fight linear broadcast begins.

Jaimes (16-2-1, 11 KOs), of Stockton, California, lost a one-sided, 10-round unanimous decision to former WBA super lightweight champ Rolando “Rolly” Romero (16-2, 13 KOs) in his last fight September 14 at T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas. The 24-year-old Jaimes might not be able to match Mason’s skill level, but the heavily favored fighter realizes that he cannot commit the same tactical mistakes that led to the abovementioned knockdowns versus Vasquez.

“He likes to fight for sure,” Mason said. “If you get in there and bang with him, he gonna bang with you for sure. He lets his hands go. He box a little bit, but I’d say that’s one thing, he likes to fight. You know, if I step in there with him, he like to trade. So, I gotta fight smart.”