NXT North American Championship: Oba Femi VS Lexis King
After both Lyra Valkyria and Shotzi arrived at the arena, NXT kicked off with Oba Femi putting his NXT North American Championship on the line against Lexis King. Lexis King got in a decent bit of offense to begin with before Mr. Stone decided to come down to ringside. Lexis then decided to push over Mr. Stone because he felt like it before Oba Femi hit a few of his moves to get the victory. I’m not kidding, this match went less than 4 minutes and I don’t know, it just felt a little bit pointless.
Grade: C
Baron Corbin and Bron Breakker Celebrate, Roxanne Perez VS Wren Sinclair, Josh Briggs VS Brooks Jensen
Thea Hail explained to Jacy Jayne and Jazmyn Nyx why her date with Riley Osbourne went so poorly before Arianna Grace came over to try and grant some words of wisdom. Not only did this feel like something out of Disney (it gave me Enchanted vibes), but I was also quite disappointed by the fact that we weren’t going to see their Valentine’s Date as I’d been looking forward to it for two weeks now! Anyway, Lyra Valkyria made it clear to Tatum Paxley that she has a surprise waiting for her as long as Tatum stays in the back for tonight’s NXT Women’s Championship match before Baron Corbin and Bron Breakker arrived to celebrate their NXT Tag Team Championship victory. Baron and Bron had both fun with themselves and the crowd before Chase University arrived to remind the Champs that they already had a Tag Team Title opportunity promised by The Family. This brought out Axiom and Nathan Frazer who weren’t impressed by this before Ava arrived to book a Number 1 Contender’s Match for later in the night. This was totally acceptable, Corbin and Breakker are quite funny whilst this did a good job at establishing a couple of new challengers.
Grade: C+
Roxanne Perez said she’s sick of people jumping the line when it comes to getting Title opportunities before it was time for Roxanne Perez to take on Wren Sinclair. This was alright, it wasn’t anything special, but I thought both Roxanne and Wren did well with what they had. The story here is Roxanne Perez is growing increasingly frustrated and angry over the fact that she has been screwed out of her NXT Women’s Championship on multiple occasions and I’m certainly here for a more edgy, Heel-like Roxy. In the end, Perez dropped Sinclair with Pop Rox before she locked in a submission to get the tap-out victory. It’s never a bad thing to add another move to the arsenal, especially when you’re in NXT.
Grade: C+
Drew Gulak and the rest of The No Quarter Catch Crew warned Noam Dar that they will be invoking “The Catch Clause” next week when it comes to the NXT Heritage Cup Match. After this, it was time for a battle of former teammates as Josh Briggs and Brooks Jensen collided. I actually thought this was a good match as both guys brought a lot of fire. I’ve always thought Josh Briggs has the potential to be a singles star in the future, but Brooks Jensen also deserves some praise as he looked pretty good here. Jensen actually got quite a lot of offense in, but in the end, back-to-back lariat’s from Briggs was enough for him to pin Brooks for the 3 count before he hugged “his brother” when the match was over. This was definitely odd, but I don’t mind it one bit!
Grade: B-
Arianna Grace VS Jacy Jayne, Axiom and Nathan Frazer VS Chase University: NXT Tag Team Championship Number 1 Contender’s Match, Kelani Jordan VS Lash Legend
Dijak had Joe Gacy locked in some kind of containment room before Luca Crusifino walked in and said this isn’t legal. Dijak didn’t seem to care. Carmelo Hayes then returned to the Barbers to cut a great promo on his history with Trick Williams and why he had to get Trick before Trick got HIM. This was really well done, and I just love Heel Melo! It was then time for another match as Arianna Grace took on Jacy Jayne. This was the first time I’d seen Jacy Jayne in the ring for a while and she looked pretty good here as the more experienced talent. Interestingly, it felt like WWE was starting to turn Jacy into more of a Babyface, but I’m not so sure now as Jayne distracted the referee in order to allow Thea Hail to attack Arianna. Thea wouldn’t, but Jazmyn Nyx would and this ultimately helped Jacy Jayne pick up the victory before Jayne and Nyx embraced as Hail looked on with a look of confusion. To be honest, I was quite confused too!
Grade: C+
Tony D’Angelo made it clear to Channing “Stacks” Lorenzo and Adrianna Rizzo that they’re no longer going to go after the NXT Tag Team Championships and they’re going to start looking at the bigger picture before Ridge Holland had a sit-down interview where he talked about feeling judged. None of this Ridge stuff is working. Chase University then walked past Jacy Jayne, Jazmyn Nyx, and a dejected Thea Hail as it was time for Chase U to take on the team of Axiom and Nathan Frazer in an NXT Tag Team Championship Number 1 Contender’s Match. This was a good contest between two teams I like very much. Chase U are so much fun, especially Duke Hudson’s hot tag, whilst Axiom and Nathan Frazer make everything look both awesome and effortless. In the end, though, it was actually Mr. Chase who scored the victory with a roll-up on Frazer before The O.C. arrived out of absolutely nowhere as Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson dropped both teams to stand tall. Considering Gallows and Anderson do literally nothing on SmackDown, I have no problem with them being on NXT.
Grade: B-
Ilja Dragunov accepted Carmelo Hayes’ NXT Championship challenge before Dragunov warned Melo that he will make him pay before Fallon Henley and Thea Hail bonded in the locker room over questionable friends and bad Valentine's Day Dates. Fallon and Thea would be a genuinely good team for the NXT Women’s Dusty Cup. Anyway, Kelani Jordan then made her way down to the ring as it was time for the Breakout Star to go one-on-one with Lash Legend. I thought this was pretty decent, I rate Lash Legend in the ring whilst Kelani Jordan looks to have a lot of potential. Jordan also came close to winning at one point, but interference from Jakara Jackson followed by a vicious Slam Dunk from Legend was enough for Lash to get the W. Kiana James and Izzi Dame did arrive after the match to further beat down Jordan, but Kelani was able to escape.
Grade: C+
NXT Women’s Championship: Lyra Valkyria VS Shotzi
After The O.C. told Kelly Kincaid that they are here to stay in NXT, it was Main Event time as Lyra Valkyria put her NXT Women’s Championship on the line against Shotzi. The action for the first few minutes in this match where alright, but unfortunately, it went wrong for Shotzi as an attempted DDT to the outside resulted in The Ballsy Badass landing funny on her leg and ultimately tearing her ACL, meaning the match had to be cancelled. As this week’s NXT was recorded last week, it was already knowledge that Shotzi had gotten injured due to her being taken out of an Elimination Chamber Qualifying Match last Friday. However, what I didn’t know is how NXT were going to deal with it. What they did is Ava came out to issue an Open Challenge which was accepted by Lash Legend before Lyra and Lash had a decent 6-to-7-minute match that resulted with Valkyria retaining after delivering her Signature Splash. I have to hand it to NXT, they did really well here. Lash Legend especially deserves a lot of praise as she’s not that experienced in this industry, and also, fair play for turning this into a storyline as Roxanne Perez appeared in the back and through the TV over after realising what had happened. As unfortunate as Shotzi’s injury is, I’m very impressed with how NXT dealt with this and how Lash Legend (and even Lyra Vakyria to an extent) stepped up here.
