NEW YORK – Andy Cruz secured a shot at the IBF lightweight title Saturday night.

Whether Cruz’s championship chance will come next remains to be seen. Eddie Hearn, Cruz’s promoter, revealed after Cruz’s fifth-round stoppage of Hironori Mishiro that the IBF’s newly elevated lightweight champion, Raymond Muratalla, might be afforded the option of making a voluntary defense of his 135-pound crown next.

If Muratalla (23-0, 17 KOs) decides to fight someone other than Cruz in his next bout, Hearn would schedule an interim fight for Cruz, presumably against an opponent with little chance of upsetting the 2021 Olympic gold medalist.

Cuba’s Cruz (6-0, 3 KOs) earned the No. 1 position in the IBF’s lightweight rankings by battering Japan’s Mishiro (17-2-1, 6 KOs) for four-plus rounds on the Richardson Hitchins-George Kambosos Jr. undercard in The Theater at Madison Square Garden. Cruz entered their IBF elimination match ranked third by the IBF, whereas Mishiro was rated fifth.

“He’s now the mandatory [for Muratalla],” Hearn said regarding Cruz during a post-fight press conference early Sunday morning. “Obviously, Muratalla’s been elevated, so we have to see what plans he has. I don’t believe he has a date locked in, but they may give him a period of time where he’s allowed a voluntary defense. One of the reasons we wanted to take this opportunity was because we know the IBF will follow their rules. And that’s very important to us when it comes to Andy Cruz because if he was mandatory with another governing body, we understand that sometimes the rules aren’t quite as solid as the IBF.

“So, Muratalla being elevated, we believe he should fight his mandatory challenger immediately. And we would like it if that was ordered. If he does have a defense, it will be one defense and then we will fight in the meantime as well. But you know it’s inevitable with [Muratalla and Cruz], and that was one of the attractions about fighting this final eliminator.”

Muratalla, of Fontana, California, beat Russian contender Zaur Abdullaev (20-2, 12 KOs) by unanimous decision to win the IBF interim lightweight title May 10 at Pechanga Arena in San Diego. The IBF elevated Muratalla from interim champion once its lightweight champ, Vasiliy Lomachenko, announced his retirement June 5.

Lomachenko (18-3, 12 KOs), a three-weight world champion from Ukraine, was given until August 8 to determine whether he would fight again. Had he continued his career, the two-time Olympic gold medalist would’ve been ordered to make a mandated defense of an IBF belt he won 13 months ago against Muratalla.