NXT TakeOver: New York emanated from the Barclays Center in Brooklyn on April 5, 2019. LFG.
NXT TakeOver: New York Results
NXT Tag Team Championship: War Raiders def. Aleister Black & Ricochet – We got fuckin’ real vikings, y’all. I’ve loved this run of Black & Ricochet together. This one had all the ingredients of an energetic opening contest – fast-paced, seamless offense, high impact, a hot crowd that was eating out of the palm
War Raiders are physical as shit, but Hanson’s spring board back elbow to Ricochet was as impressive as it gets. Everything the War Raiders do looks like it hurts, including when they use each other as a weapon.
That spot where Ricochet hit the corkscrew tiger drop to the outside, and then Hanson hit the cannonball had me dead. Ricochet hit a beautiful shooting star press, but Hanson broke up the count by driving Black into the pinfall attempt. Ultimately, the War Raiders get the win after folding Ricochet in half. Rating: 8.5/10. This is about as perfect a tag team wrestling match as you’ll ever see.
North American Championship: Velveteen Dream def. Matt Riddle – Such an interesting match-up. Between Riddle’s Yankees gear and Dream’s outlandish entrance, this one felt like a main event production from the jump. I had just come back from the dead and then Dream hulked up on Riddle so I died again.
Riddle hits the ankle lock, but Dream kicks out of it. Riddle grabs the foot Dream was kicking with and puts the ankle lock on it. Excellent stuff.
Riddle is such a damn freak of nature. He picks dream up while standing ON THE SECOND ROPE and German suplexes him into the ring. Then, he pops up to the top rope and hits the Floating Bro, which is essentially a moonsault that corkscrews into a senton.
Dream just keeps kicking out of stuff. Finally, Riddle hits the Bromission, but Dream reverses momentum into a pinfall attempt. 1-2-3. Dream wins. Rating: 7.5/10. Like I said, this one was interesting to begin with, but the final few minutes were exquisite professional wrestling.
NXT UK Championship: Walter def. Pete Dunne – Holy shit, the promo for this was AMAZING. Some good gamesmanship to start between two thoroughbreds, loved Dunne avoiding the chops to begin with. Walter finally hits a couple and damn it – it sounds like he is chopping Dunne’s soul out of his body.
LOVED how they sold Walter’s strength and striking ability against Dunne’s joint manipulation. Methodical pace, but they turn it on with some quick exchanges and counters that display Dunne’s strength as well. Dunne hits a moonsault to the outside of the ring, and both guys are down.
Walter goes for a superplex, but Dunne grabs his fingers and bends the shit out of them. Dunne hits a sitdown powerbomb for a two count and holy shit, LFG. Dunne hits a double stomp to the outside, and that made MY insides turn. This one’s getting brutal.
My God, Walter just literally stepped on Dunne’s throat. This is awesome. They’re literally stomping and hitting the shit out of each other and pulling each other’s limbs out of place. This is like watching torture.
Walter hits a nasty burning lariat. Dunne hits the Bitter End, but WALTER KICKS OUT.
Walter hits a powerbomb off the top rope and follows it up with a big splash. Rating: 9/10. This one is an instant classic.
NXT Women’s Championship: Shayna Baszler def. Bianca Belair, Kairi Sane, and Io Shirai – Baszler gettin’ the Goldberg style entrance and I am HERE. FOR.IT. I’m curious to see how this one pans out. The multi-person matches are always tricky.
We get Belair and Baszler with someone one on one action before Shirai hops back in. Sane isn’t too far behind her. Shirai and Sane team up and deliver a double dropkick on Baszler and suddenly the Sky Pirates are facing each other. A quick exchange before it’s broken up.
Baszler throws Belair into the turnbuckle by her hair. Yikes. On the outside, Baszler tries to pull Belair into the ring post by her hair, but Belair reverses and uses it to pull Baszler into the post. Pretty hard hit there, too.
All four women end up back in the ring and we get a big suplex/powerbomb/etc. move out of the turnbuckle that has all four laid out. Shirai tosses Sane over her damn head to the outside onto Belair and Baszler. The Sky Pirates are firing on all cylinders to borrow a cliche from organized team sports journalism.
Belair throws Shirai onto Sane and Baszler on the outside. This is just high octane offense, to borrow another cliche from organized team sports journalism, folks. Belair and Baszler end up in the ring together, where Baszler attempts to choke out Belair. Belair ends up hooking the KOD, but Shirai breaks up the pin fall attempt. Shirai hits two moonsaults on Baszler, but Sane breaks up the count. This is fast and furious, y’all.
We get that Sane on Shirai conflict, and Sane delivers an Alabama Slam on Shirai….onto Baszler. Elbow drop, but Shirai breaks up the count. “TURNABOUT IS FAIR PLAY,” shouts Mauro.
Sane hits a sick spike DDT on Shirai, and goes up for an elbow drop, but Belair hops up and hits her with her hair. Belair hits a DOUBLE KOD on Sane and Shirai, but when she goes for the pin, Baszler kicks her in the damn face. She locks in the Kirifuda Clutch and it’s over. Rating: 7/10. That was fun. I need a nap.
NXT Championship, 2/3 Falls: Johnny Gargano def. Adam Cole – Happy to see Cole get this main, but the action started off at a very slow, plodding pace. A lot of holds and gamesmanship – “fundamental wrestling” as Mauro Ranallo called it.
Cole wears down Gargano with headlocks, keeping Johnny Wrestling grounded. I’m half asleep while I’m writing this, by the way, y’all. We finally get some rope-runnin’ that leads to a sick double cross body. The pace quickens and we get a nice little chess match between the two. Cole gets the first fall with the Last Shot.
Gargano takes a couple of nasty tumbles when he spears Cole on the apron and then does a front flip onto him on the outside. Sick. Gargano wins the second fall by submission.
We get some nice striking exchanges in the third fall. I’m not sure why wrestling Twitter was so hard on this match. I’m sittin’ here saying, “man, this is awesome.”
Welp – my WWE Network account is fucking up. Legit gets to the end of the match and starts playing the pre-show. No clue what is going on there, but here’s how this thing wraps up courtesy of Bleacher Report:
A dramatic count-out tease gave way to a big superkick from Cole, who could only hold his opponent down for a count of two. He followed up with a second try at the Panama Sunrise, but Gargano countered into the Garga-No Escape. The Undisputed Era’s Roderick Strong, Kyle O’Reilly and Bobby Fish hit the ring, laying Gargano out but not keeping him down for the count. Gargano wiped out the interferers but fell prey to two superkicks and the Last Shot…but he still kicked out as the fans jam-packed into Barclays Center came unglued. A frustrated Cole yelled, “it’s my time,” opening him up to one last Garga-No Escape. After fighting through the pain, Cole finally tapped, giving Gargano the long-awaited title victory. After an emotion celebration with his family at ringside, Gargano and wife Candice LeRae were joined on stage by Tommaso Ciampa, who embraced his friend-turned-foe, bringing an end to their legendary rivalry.
What a shit-show way to end this review that’s already five days late? Anyway, this match was the tits. Rating: 8/10.
Overall: 8/10. Why can’t WWE shows always be like this?
Stoney Keeley is the Editor in Chief of The SoBros Network. He is a strong supporter of Team GSD and #BeBetter. “Big Natural” covers the Tennessee Titans, Alabama Crimson Tide football, the WWE, and a whole wealth of nonsense. Follow on Twitter @StoneyKeeley
Check out the SoBros Shop. Subscribe to our Patreon. Give us money for no reason. Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter @SoBrosNetwork. Listen on SoundCloud. Watch on YouTube.
