Charlotte Flair will defend her NXT women’s championship against Io Shirai and Rhea Ripley.
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Sean CoyleESPN
In terms of landscape shaping nights, it doesn’t get much bigger than what’s to come at NXT TakeOver: In Your House, with four of the six matches on the card capable of being no-brainer main events.
Adam Cole defends his NXT championship against Velveteen Dream in a Backlot Brawl, representing Dream’s last shot at Cole’s title. Charlotte Flair defends her NXT championship against both Rhea Ripley and Io Shirai. Former North American champion Johnny Gargano takes on current champ Keith Lee. And Tommaso Ciampa faces the recently debuted Karrion Kross.
There’s also a six-woman tag team match pitting Mia Yim, Shotzi Blackheart, and Tegan Nox against Candice LeRae, Dakota Kai, and Raquel González, and Finn Balor takes on Damian Priest.
Sean Coyle is breaking down the action live as it happens, along with a rating that breaks down each match on a personalized 0-5 scale.
(c) – Indicates defending champion
Finn Balor vs. Damian Priest
Match in progress…
Mia Yim, Shotzi Blackheart, def. Tegan Nox vs. Candice LeRae, Dakota Kai, and Raquel González
This match featured several different rivalries crossing over at once, and there’s no denying the overall level of talent in the match. Mia Yim and Candice LeRae have been at each other’s throats while their significant others, Johnny Gargano and Keith Lee, face off for the NXT North American championship. Shotzi Blackheart and Tegan Nox have butted heads with Dakota Kai and Raquel Gonzalez on recent episodes of NXT TV in recent weeks.
There was no sticking to natural rivalries, although each of those sequences was particularly charged. Gonzalez illustrated her strength advantage early on, getting the better of both Yim and Nox. After a tag, Kai and Nox took center stage to continue their long standing rivalry with some nicely timed sequences.
Frequent tags and drastic swings in momentum were the story of the night, until they took to the skies. After Blackheart was caught out of midair by Gonzalez after attempting a suicide dive, Yim, LeRae and Nox connected with various planchas to the outside of the ring.
Yim and LeRae had a nice exchange in which Yim connected with a beautiful dragon suplex, but their battle got so intense that they tussled with each other all the way backstage, which left us with a standard two-on-two tag team bout.
That opened the door for the Nox and Blackheart to gain leverage, culminating with Nox hitting her patented shiniest wizard knee strike onto heated rival Kai for the pinfall victory.
What’s next? The Yim-LeRae conflict should continue in the coming weeks, but with a definitive win for Nox over Kai, perhaps they’ll finally go their separate ways. There are certainly plenty of options with a deep NXT women’s division.
Still to come
– Backlot Brawl for the NXT championship: Adam Cole (c) vs. Velveteen Dream
– NXT women’s championship: Charlotte Flair (c) vs. Io Shirai vs. Rhea Ripley
– NXT North American championship: Keith Lee (c) vs. Johnny Gargano
– Tommaso Ciampa vs. Karrion Kross
