Boxer Gennady Golovkin gets the stage, knows he needs the style points

Gennady Golovkin could hardly suppress a smile as his training camp in Big Bear began. He had arrived. He was heading into his first pay-per-view card.

Golovkin, the unbeaten World Boxing Assn. middleweight champion (33-0, 30 knockouts) from Kazakhstan, will meet his most talented adversary yet, Canada’s International Boxing Federation champion David Lemieux (34-2, 31 KOs) Saturday night at a sold-out Madison Square Garden.

“This camp [was] different because he finally sees somebody who is a challenge for him and he’s like, ‘How come it’s taken so long?’” said Abel Sanchez, Golovkin’s trainer. “He has that smile … because he’s ready to go to work.

“You can talk about technical and tactical all you want, but you know how Golovkin fights. He’s got someone to hit now and there’s going to be a fight. He’s more enthused than I’ve ever seen him. You see this sparkle in his eye.”

Golovkin, 33, is riding a 20-fight knockout streak.

Lemieux, 26, promises to show the type of aggression that gave him four knockdowns in a June title victory.

Sanchez predicts the bout will end before the fifth bell.

“My first pay per view [will be] a big present for people, because we both have power,” Golovkin said. “It’s going to be a street fight. Old school.”

The interest in Golovkin has spiked from the time he signed in 2011 with Tom Loeffler, a Los Angeles-based promoter who also guides the career of heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko.

Loeffler and Golovkin were connected by a mutual friend, Roland Simoneschi, who was Golovkin’s head of security and knew Loeffler through Klitschko. A meeting between Loeffler and Golovkin’s manager, Oleg Hermann, was arranged.

“We all hit it off from the beginning, because we had the same game plan: Get him [out of Germany] to the U.S., where all the big fights were,” Loeffler said.

Golovkin, a silver medal winner in the 2004 Olympics, has punching power in both hands in addition to good ring discipline partly sharpened by Sanchez’s orders to dissect old Julio Cesar Chavez Sr. fight tapes.

Golovkin debuted in the U.S. in 2012 and appeared on HBO that year. He fought four times in 2013 and needed fewer than 12 total rounds to flatten his three opponents foes last year, including a second-round beating of Marco Antonio Rubio on an HBO fight that drew 1.34 million viewers.

Golovkin’s dominance while in the process of building his name recognition made him easier to avoid, and some, including Julio Cesar Chavez Jr. and Andre Ward, have.

The Lemieux fight is viewed by the Golovkin team as the showing that will answer the “Who’s he fought?” criticism and catapult him to a string of major bouts.

Golovkin hasworked to master English and moved to Los Angeles last year, with 12,000 in attendance for his May sixth-round technical knockout of Willie Monroe Jr. at the Forum, which peaked on HBO with 1.5 million viewers.

“His intelligent aggression, [knowing] the best defense is to hit the guy — it’s a change from what we’ve seen,” former HBO analyst Larry Merchant said in reference to Mayweather.

“Boxing is a sport, but it’s also entertainment, and the worst sin in entertainment is to bore people. The way Gennady approaches his fights, you can see he’s trying to make something happen, and that’s what people want to see. The highest form of the game is the guy who boxes as well as bangs. He’s a cerebral killer.”

There’s fierce motivation at play that Golovkin carries quietly.

His brothers, Vadim and Sergey, were killed in military action serving for Russia. Older brother Vadim was the one who first accompanied Gennady to the boxing gym in their tough neighborhood, and he’s who the boxer named his son after.

Remaining humble and dedicated has helped the fighter soak in Sanchez’s lessons.

Another video presentation Sanchez gave Golovkin involved cutting horses, which the trainer said is analogous to how a boxer should move to limit an opponent’s escape routes during a bout.

“[Lemieux] thinks just power,” as if the fight will last only, “three-four rounds, but this is boxing,” Golovkin said. “Every second, every step, every round. This is [being prepared for] 12 rounds.”

So the knockout streak isn’t an obsession?

“Why?” Golovkin answered.

If he has to show the strength of his chin, the depth of his training or his fortitude, Golovkin says he’ll do so to continue his quest for a unified middleweight title.

The World Boxing Council has already declared that the Nov. 21 winner of champion Miguel Cotto and Saul “Canelo” Alvarez must fight Golovkin next.

First, Golovkin needs to prove on his greatest stage whether he deserves to replace Mayweather atop the mythical pound-for-pound ratings.

“I don’t mind [to do that], the focus is on boxing,” Golovkin said. “People understand … [they] like my style. And I know my work, my job.”

lance.pugmire@latimes.com

Twitter: @latimespugmire