Cotto and Jennings to battle for WBO welterweight crown

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Boxing headliners Miguel Cotto and Kelly Pavlik appear on a unique double-bill of title fights staged in two different cities on February 21 as both look to recover from their first defeats.

Puerto Rican Cotto takes on Briton Michael Jennings for the vacant WBO welterweight title at New York's Madison Square Garden, while Mexico's Marco Antonio Rubio challenges WBO and WBC middleweight champ Pavlik in his hometown of Youngstown, Ohio.

The title fights have separate undercards at their respective arenas, where fans will also get to see the night's other championship fight via a pay-per-view doubleheader from promoters Top Rank.

"I'm hungrier now, more than before," Cotto, 28, told reporters at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday about his determination to claim the crown by beating Jennings, a slick boxer from Manchester, England, who has a 34-1 record.

Cotto, 32-1 with 26 wins within the distance, lost his WBA welterweight crown in his last bout to Mexico's Antonio Margarito, who bloodied his nose and stopped him in the 11th round in Las Vegas last July.

Pavlik, 26, is climbing back into the ring for the first time since he lost a 12-round decision to 43-year-old Bernard Hopkins after moving up 10 pounds in a catch-weight contest in October that dropped him to 34-1.

Rubio, 28, is 43-4-1 including 38 stoppages.

"I still feel like a champion but I have a lot of proving to do," Pavlik said. "I feel I have to go in there and shine with a dominating performance."

Jennings, 31, admitted to being a longtime admirer of Cotto but was all business about his showdown with the Puerto Rican.

"It's a big opportunity for me to go out and prove myself. do the best I can, box well and hopefully pull the shock off," he told Reuters.

"He's a tremendous fighter. He's a big hitter. He likes to move forward. I use more lateral movement, I use my feet a lot more and my hand speed."

Jennings, fighting outside Britain for the first time, said he was not coming to New York on a holiday. "I'm coming to win a world title," he said.

Cotto said he had never seen Jennings fight, and was only worried about preparing himself properly for a war in the ring, the first of what he hopes will be three fights in 2009.

Jennings should not feel slighted since hard-hitting Cotto does not seem to spend much time watching video.

Asked if he had looked over replays of his defeat by Margarito, who he was outpunching earlier in the fight, the former champion said: "I never saw it. No need to see it. I've been there."

(Reporting by Larry Fine, Editing by Alan Baldwin)