Less than two months later, Dundee was given the opportunity to fight featherweight champion, and war hero, Eugene Criqui. He lost 28 pounds in four weeks in order to fight him, making 126 pounds on the days of the fight. Criqui had beaten Johnny Kilbane two days after Dundee's fight with Bernstein, with a sixth round knockout. However, part of the contract for this fight required that he give Dundee a shot at the title within sixty days. Fifty-four days later, on July 26, 1923, Dundee fought Criqui. He knocked him down four times and beat him by a fifteen-round decision.