The death of Prichard Colón at 33 has brought renewed attention to the October 17, 2015 fight that permanently changed the Puerto Rican boxer’s life and to the man standing across the ring from him that night, Terrel Williams. Colón suffered a catastrophic brain injury after a bout in which Williams landed punches to the back of his head, including an illegal blow for which he was deducted a point. Colón later collapsed and underwent emergency brain surgery.
For Williams, the fight also became a dividing line in his life. He did not compete again for more than two years, returning in November 2017. In a revealing 2019 interview with The Washington Post, Williams said he could no longer enter a boxing ring feeling invincible because the possibility of another tragedy was always in his mind. “It affected his life forever. And it affected my life forever,” he said.
Terrel Williams thought about Prichard every day
Williams said he never intended to maliciously hurt Colón and stopped short of issuing an explicit apology in that interview. But when asked about guilt, he paused before acknowledging how deeply the situation affected him and said he thought about it every day. He also said friends kept him informed about Colón’s recovery and that he prayed for him daily.
The experience even changed how Williams viewed boxing inside his own family. At the time of the interview, he was living in Los Angeles with his wife and three sons, whom he had never told that he was a professional boxer. Williams said he would never allow his sons to become boxers. He also revealed that he had wanted to visit Colón in the hospital after the fight but had been advised against doing so.
Williams eventually rebuilt part of his career, but his championship ambitions never materialized. His final recorded professional appearance came against Thomas Dulorme on September 21, 2019, when Williams suffered his first professional defeat by unanimous decision. His record stands at 18-1, and no subsequent professional fights are recorded.
Since then, Williams has largely disappeared from public view. There is no verified public statement from him yet following Colón’s death on August 13, 2026. What remains is what Williams himself acknowledged years ago: regardless of everything that happened afterward, October 17, 2015 became a night neither fighter could ever truly leave behind.
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