It was a tale of two halves, but when the dust settled on Mason's Cleveland homecoming bout, he emerged with a 12th-round stoppage of Albert Bell to retain his WBO lightweight title at Wolstein Center on Saturday.

Before dropping Bell twice to stop him in the final round, Mason (21-0, 18 KOs) said that his corner believed the fight still hung in the balance.

“I trusted in my corner to put on that performance and to end it with a stoppage,” Mason said after his main event win in the “The Fight” series on DAZN and TNT.

“I feel like early on, from the second half up, I was seeing shots I could have set up upstairs and all those types of shots. I was showing him a little mercy, but someone had told me, ‘You might be down on the cards,’ and I was like, ‘Alright, bet,’ ... I walked out there and smacked him with a shot that I was seeing all night.”

While he wouldn't have known, the 22-year-old champion ultimately didn't need a knockout to win the fight. He led 107-102 twice and 106-103 across the judges’ scorecards heading into the final frame.

Bell (28-1, 9 KOs) took the fight on 10 days’ notice after Mason’s original opponent Joe Cordina couldn’t secure a visa to come to the U.S. due to an assault charge. The 33-year-old from Toledo, Ohio, controlled the first half, using his 6-foot frame and counter-punching to pepper Mason with straight right hands and keep him off balance.

Mason, The Ring’s No. 5-ranked lightweight, took control in the seventh round when he started to find a home for his left hand, one of which left Bell unable to breathe out of his nose. The dynamic southpaw continued to batter Bell upstairs and to the body in the eighth and ninth rounds to change the complexion of the fight completely.

“I made that adjustment with the help of my corner,” Mason said. “They were telling me to set up the shots. Don't throw one; don't load up on those shots. I had to make sure I broke him down first and implemented whatever I've seen inside of that.”

Even when Mason’s pace slowed in the 10th and 11th rounds, Bell couldn’t mount the same offensive attack that allowed him to build an early lead. Believing the fight hung in the balance entering the final round, Mason immediately let his hands go and dropped Bell five seconds into the 12th with a pair of left hands.

Mason continued to walk Bell down, and he dropped him again with a left hand, prompting referee Mark Nelson to stop the fight without a count.

“I saw that he was hurt,” Mason said. “I just had to step on it. He wasn't gonna get out of there. I had to make it happen, and I had to push him off the field. He wasn’t going to jump himself.“