WWE kicked off Survivor Series weekend with NXT Takeover Wargames– the night featured four scheduled matches and a surprise match at the top of the show all of which kept the crowd on the edge of their seats for the entire night.
NXT Takeover has quickly become one of the hottest tickets for wrestling fans due to their impressive and skilled young roster.
Below is a rundown of the epic night.
1. Matt Riddle defeated Kassius Ohno
The Los Angeles crowd greeted one of the newest additions to the NXT roster Matt Riddle with a superstar reaction. Riddle took to the mic to say that he was scheduled to face Ohno this Wednesday on NXT TV but would rather do it now. Of course, this got the crowd going.
Kassius Ohno’s music hit and made his way out and accepted Riddle’s challenge, saying he would be happy to put him to sleep.
The bell rang and Riddle hit Ohno with a flying knee and pinned him. The match was less than 10 seconds but the crowd loved every second of it. Thus, Matt Riddle came out looking like a star. Riddle already has the total package and the fans recognize that.
2. NXT Women’s Championship: Shayna Baszler defeated Kairi Sane
Shayna won this 2/3 falls match 2-1. This was great match with incredible heat. The match starts out with Kairi dominating Shayna until Jessamyn Duke and Marina Shafir come in and do a number on Kairi. The crowd absolutely hated this, they started chanting profanity to show their displeasure. This led to Shayna choking out Sane to get the first fall.
The second fall started with Shayna hitting a knee to the face and attempting a pin on Sane. The crowd thought this would be the finish and they weren’t happy about it. Luckily, Sane kicked out but Shayna was still dominating until Sane made a comeback when Shayna attempted a suplex on the apron but Sane countered it by spiking Shayna with a sick looking DDT. Sane then hit an elbow on all three women, rolled Shayna back into the ring and hit her with the insane elbow to pick up the win in the second fall.
The third fall had both women going back and fourth. Marina and Jessamyn interfered until Dakota Kai came out to help Sane but was still out numbered. Io Sharai came out to even the odds and hit a beautiful moonsault to the outside to wipe out the three women. This left Sane and Shayna in the inside. Sane then went up and hit her insane elbow but Shayna countered it by hooking her arm and rolling her to to pick up the win and retain the title. The crowd hated Shayna winning.
The match was amazing and the heat for it made it that much better. Even though Sane lost a 2/3 falls match the program still feels fresh and should lead to another match.
3. Aleister Black defeated Johnny Gargano
This was one of the best matches of the year and continues Johnny Gargano’s incredible 2018 Takeover performances.
They went back and forth, trading stiff kicks, forearms, and elbows.
Gargano hit an incredible tope tornado DDT on the floor to Black. There were many near falls that the crowd went crazy for. There were many dramatic moments where it looked like Gargano was done and maybe looking for mercy from Black that slight hesitation from Black would help Johnny gain momentary advantages. The finish saw Black hit two incredible looking Black Mass kicks for the pin.
4. NXT Championship: Tommaso Ciampa defeated Velveteen Dream
This was a good match that the crowd turned into a great match.
Velveteen came out in Hollywood Hogan cosplay and the crowd went nuts for it. This was another back-and-forth match with both guys getting a chance to shine. People early on didn’t expect a title change but as the match went along the crowd started buying Velveteen’s near falls more. The crowd was also into Velveteen doing all of Hogan’s trademark spots. The biggest pop of the match was when Velveteen hit his rolling dvd onto the exposed floor and rolled Ciampa back into the ring to hit his top rope elbow. That near fall made the people think they were witnessing a title change. The finish was Ciampa hitting a draping DDT onto the steel that was in between both rings.
5. War Games: Ricochet, Pete Dunne & War Raiders defeated The Undisputed Era
This was a long match with an incredible last 10 minutes.
The first part of the match felt like just a bunch of guys doing moves for the sake of doing moves. There was no story whether it was someone focusing on an injured body part or someone getting isolated. It was more of each guy took turns doing moves to each other until all eight guys were in. Once all eight guys were in that’s when the match picked up and we had so many incredible sequences and spots.
There were two tables broken, a tower of doom, Ricochet spring boarding from ring to ring. The most incredible spot was Ricochet doing a double moonsault from the top of the cage onto everyone. The finish was Dunne hitting the Bitter End on Adam Cole and Ricochet hitting a springboard 450 for both guys to cover and pick up the win.
All-in-all the entire show was absolutely incredible, it had everything a show needs; from a hot crowd to great matches.
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