By Keith Idec

Tony Bellew’s head-butt during their weigh-in Friday afternoon angered Adonis Stevenson so much he “wanted to kill” the mandatory challenger for his WBC light heavyweight title.

“He gave me a head-butt,” Stevenson told The Montreal Gazette after weighing in at 174.4 pounds for their HBO main event in Quebec City, Canada. “I wanted to push him and kick his ass. My guys were holding me back, because I wanted to kill him.

“He made a mistake, and I’m going to knock him out. Cold. I’m going to drop him down. If he gets up, I’m going to finish him.”

Bellew belittled Stevenson some more after the weigh-in. Among other things, the brash British contender called Stevenson “a midget” and “a pimp.” Bellew (20-1-1, 12 KOs) stands 6-foot-3, four inches taller than the favored Stevenson (22-1, 19 KOs). The pimp comment was a reference to the Haitian-born, Canadian-bred Stevenson’s reported four-year incarceration in a Quebec prison on pimping and assault convictions long before he became a professional boxer.

Stevenson’s opponent seemed enjoy antagonizing him and believes Stevenson’s emotional reaction at their weigh-in was of proof of why he’ll pull off an upset before what figures to be an decidedly pro-Stevenson crowd at Pepsi Coliseum.

“He came to me,” Bellew told The Montreal Gazette. “He pushes his face into my face. The minute he pushed his head on my head – Boom! – he got it back. And the minute he got it back, he didn’t like it. He exploded.

“He can’t stay cool and calm. I told him to come back and look me in the eyes. He didn’t want to. He wants to scream and shout and act like a crazy individual. I’m cool and calm. I bet you he’s still raging, still going crazy. He’s great going crazy when there’s 20 men around him. He’s not all there. He can’t control his emotions. That’s what is going to get him knocked out.”

The Stevenson-Bellew bout will headline HBO’s “Boxing After Dark” tripleheader, scheduled to start at 10:15 p.m. ET/PT with a replay of Manny Pacquiao’s unanimous-decision victory over Brandon Rios. The live portion of the telecast will begin with Russia’s Sergey Kovalev (22-0-1, 20 KOs) making the first defense of his WBO light heavyweight title against Ukraine’s Ismayll Sillakh (21-1, 17 KOs).

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.