by David P. Greisman

Sergey Kovalev had never gone 12 rounds — heck, he’d only gone eight rounds once before — before this past Saturday’s decision win over Bernard Hopkins.

Kovalev said he couldn’t get the knockout against Hopkins, though he tried to finish him.

“I can’t because he has very, very, very hard head,” Kovalev said at the post-fight press conference. “I hurt my hands. He got a lot of hard punch from me but he stay on his legs, like unbelievable.”

He did floor Hopkins with a well-timed counter in the first round and momentarily stunned him on a few other occasions.

Asked when he hurt his hands, Kovalev only mentioned his left hand — hurt in the second round off a jab.

Pick up a copy of David’s book, “Fighting Words: The Heart and Heartbreak of Boxing,” at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsamazon or internationally at http://bit.ly/fightingwordsworldwide. Send questions/comments via email at fightingwords1@gmail.com