Women’s boxing has received a major boost from the success of “Million Dollar Baby.” The feature film, starring Hillary Swank, Clint Eastwood, and Morgan Freeman, has won a bushel of awards (including Golden Globes for best actress and best director) and earned seven Oscar nominations.

The movie comes at a propitious time because women’s boxing has been stagnating recently. The novelty has worn off. And unlike female competitors in track and field, basketball, tennis, and other Olympic sports, the women fighters aren’t very good. But there are exceptions.

Laila Ali is boxing’s real-life million-dollar baby. The 27-year-old daughter of Muhammad Ali began boxing professionally in 1999, and she has racked up an impressive record of 19-0 with 16 knockouts. She has a punishing jab and good power in her right hand. Her footwork is improving and she can take a punch. Laila can fight.

On Friday night, Ali enters the ring in a bout to be televised by ESPN2 Friday Night Fights. It won’t be much of a fight: Her opponent is Cassandra Geigger (6-4, 6 KOs), whose wins have all come against opponents who had never won a professional bout at the time she fought them. Her only credibility – such as it is – comes from her last outing, when she went the six-round distance in losing to Ann Wolfe, one of the better female fighters.

“It’s hard to find an opponent who represents a real challenge,” Laila admitted last week, “because there’s not much out there in women’s boxing.”

Six years ago, when Laila announced her intention to take up the sweet science, the prevailing view was one of skepticism. A lot of people (this writer included) considered her a dilettante who was simply trading on her famous father’s name. We were wrong.

“Obviously, in a lot of ways, my name helps,” Laila said 18 months ago. “But there are disadvantages too. It was hard starting out with so much attention on me. When I first got in the ring, a lot people took it as a joke. Most fighters get to learn with no one watching. If you’d seen my father in the ring when he was 12, he wouldn’t have looked like much either.”

Laila’s most publicized bouts have been an eight-round decision over Jacqui Frazier (the daughter of you-know-who) in 2001 and a fourth-round knockout of Christy Martin (the former standard-bearer for women’s boxing) in 2003.

As for future challenges, Lucia Rijker (17-0, 14 KOs), who played the villainess in “Million Dollar Baby,” is generally regarded as the best woman boxer in the world pound-for-pound. But Rijker fights at 135 pounds, 30 less than Laila. Forget that matchup.

New York gym legend Veronica Simmons (3-0, 2 KOs) fights at 165 pounds, but she hasn’t stepped into the ring since December 2002 and might be more myth than reality. And then there’s Ann Wolfe (18-1, 12 KOs), a 175-pounder from Texas, who might someday become Laila’s signature opponent.

Meanwhile, all Laila can do is keep winning and stay focused on the business in front of her. “I don’t know why I chose to express myself through boxing,” she said, reflecting back on her journey. “Fighting is crazy; I know that. If everything was completely my way, I probably would have chosen something else. But boxing is my calling.”

Does she see herself as an ambassador for women’s boxing?

“Not really. I don’t put that kind of pressure on myself because boxing is an individual sport. I didn’t get into it to be concerned about anybody else other than myself. With anything I do, I want to represent well, and I want to be positive. But at the same time, I really don’t give a damn about any of the other women in the sport. None of them are worried about me, and I feel the same way about them.”

So what’s important to her?

“My goal is to be a well-rounded fighter. I want to continue fighting and keep getting better. I can’t say that I’m a great fighter, but I’m a good fighter and I want to be respected as a fighter by people who know boxing. You get tired of hearing, ‘Oh, you do this just so you can start modeling.’ People don’t realize what it means to be a fighter. You brutalize your body. The public doesn’t really understand boxing, so what the public thinks about my boxing skills isn’t that important to me. I want to be respected by people in the boxing game.”

She is.

***

When Zab Judah lost a welterweight title-unification bout by decision to Cory Spinks last April, he told the world that, given 30 more seconds, he would have knocked Spinks out. Last weekend, Zab had 12 more rounds. True to his word, he finished the job.

It was a fast-paced bout between two southpaws who are excellent tacticians. But Judah was the aggressor and also the bigger puncher. He hurt Spinks with a body shot in Round 3 and staggered him with a right hook in the seventh. In Round 9, he knocked him out.

It was Judah’s best performance as a pro and raises the question of what comes next. A rubber match with Spinks is one possibility. But lucrative fights against Oscar De La Hoya and Shane Mosley at a catch-weight between 147 and 154 pounds are possible. And there are a number of 140-pounders like Arturo Gatti, Miguel Cotto, and Vivian Harris who might step up in weight for a shot at Zab.

In the featured under card bout, Monte Barrett ran his record to 31-3 (17 knockouts) with a ninth-round stoppage of the previously unbeaten Owen Beck in an entertaining heavyweight slugfest. Neither man looked like a world-class heavyweight. But these days, very few fighters do.