June 17, 2000 6:21 AM AP

LAS VEGAS (AP) A 6-inch height disadvantage against Andrew Golota was too much for Orlin Norris to overcome.

Golota, hoping for a match against Mike Tyson, won a unanimous decision over Norris in their 10-round heavyweight match Friday night.

Norris, unable to continue his last fight when Tyson slugged him after the bell ending the first round, went the distance this time, but could not match punches with Golota, who at 6-foot-4 was able to land from a distance against his 5-10 foe.

The judges favored Golota by scores of 98-92, 99-91 and 97-94 in the bout at Mandalay Bay. There were no knockdowns.

Golota came close to winning the heavyweight title twice in 1996. He was beating undisputed champion Riddick Bowe in each of their two fights, only to lose on disqualifications for hitting low.

After the victory over Norris, Golota looked ahead.

"Tyson is a faster and stronger than Norris. It would be a very interesting fight. Tyson is much tougher," Golota said.

Norris opened a cut over the right eye of Golota, the WBC's 10th-ranked contender, with an overhand right in the seventh round. But Golota's corner stopped the bleeding between rounds, and the cut was no factor.

Norris, who pressed the action much of the time, but who never seemed to have open shots at his opponent, was stunned by the onesided voting by the judges.

"I don't believe it, but it has been the story of my life," he said. "I am a motivated heavyweight and they do this to me?

"But I am not a person to be down. That's boxing, the state of boxing."

Golota, 32, a native of Poland who lives in Chicago, weighed 238 pounds as he improved his record to 36-4, with 28 knockouts.

The 34-year-old Norris, a former champion as a 190-pound cruiserweight who was fighting at a career-high 230, fell to 50-6, with 27 knockouts.

Also on the Mandalay Bay card, 25-year-old Juan Lazcano, 14 years younger than his foe, dominated Wilfredo Vazquez throughout the fight and stopped him at 59 seconds of the ninth round of their scheduled 15-round match for the vacant NABF lightweight title.

Lazcano, who was born in Juarez, Mexico, and now lives in Sacramento, Calif., had Vazquez, from Puerto Rico, sagging on the ropes, unable to defend himself, when the bout was stopped.

It was the 17th knockout for Lazcano, who weighed 133½ pounds as he ran his record to 23-2-1. Vazquez, a three-time former world champion who turns 40 on Aug. 2, is 52-9-3, including losses in two of his last two fights.

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