9 of 10 rounds. Just two months later he was back at Madison Square Garden for the biggest fight of his life - a title match against the European middleweight champion Marcel Cerdan. Although Roach won the first round, the 32-year-old Cerdan pummeled Roach to a knockout victory, knocking him down three times in the second round and four times in the eighth before a crowd of almost 17,000. Roach suffered his first loss in nearly two years which put an end to his 18-fight winning streak. Roach then retired from boxing for some 18 months before launching an ill-fated comeback. Comeback and death After a short retirement Roach was back in the ring. After a few easy wins Roach was scheduled to fight an exhibition bout on his 25th birthday against Georgie Small at the St. Nicholas Arena in Manhattan just two weeks before his scheduled fight against Sugar Ray Robinson. For seven rounds, Roach fought rings around Small. Roach was so far ahead on points that he could not help winning, but in the eighth round Small let go a desperation right and it crashed flush on Roach's jaw. Roach's legs buckled; staggering, slack-jawed and glassy-eyed, he hung on. When the bell sounded for the tenth round Roach doggedly came out into the ring again. Small jabbed a soggy left to his mouth then a vicious right put Roach down for a count of nine but Roach wouldn't stay down. The referee had a quick look at Roach and resumed the fight but after just one quick jab to the face by Small, Roach was down for the count. Roach muttered thickly. "I'm getting up." But it took two men to help get him back to his corner. Subconsciously, Lavern Roach seemed to know what was happening, saying "I'm all right," but then quickly lapsed into a coma. Fourteen hours later, in nearby St. Clare's Hospital, Lavern Roach, 25, died of a brain hemorrhage at 12:50 pm. Only a small audience of 1,832 waded through sleet and snow to see the middleweight battle in the ancient midtown club, but hundreds of thousands of shocked television viewers saw the tragic ending of the fight over the CBS network telecast. He was the first boxing casualty of 1950 and one of the first boxers ever to suffer a fatal blow live on national television. Then and now The Lavern Roach