NXT Review: 15/04

NXT North American Championship Number 1 Contender’s Match: Lexis King VS Ethan Page VS Wes Lee VS Eddy Thorpe

Credit: WWE

The final NXT before Stand and Deliver kicked off with a Fatal 4-Way to determine the Number 1 Contender to Ricky Saints’ NXT North American Championship! Lexis King, Ethan Page, Wes Lee, and Eddy Thorpe were the four competitors here, and this was a strong start to the show, the action was really good throughout, and it was enjoyable to watch! Wes Lee was definitely the standout here; that kid should be doing a lot more than he currently is, but everyone else also had their moments too! Towards the end of the match, everyone was hitting their finishers on one another, but it was Ethan Page who eventually took advantage and dropped Lexis King with Twisted Grin to get the win! After the match was over, Page started to cut a promo, only to get dropped by Ricky Saints! Saints-Page should be pretty good!

Grade: B

NXT Women’s North American Championship Qualifying Match: Lola Vice VS Tatum Paxley, NXT Tag Team Championships Number 1 Contender’s Gauntlet Match

Jordynne Grace had a video package talking about her physical progression and what her time in TNA did for her before Sol Ruca, Zaria, Izzi Dame, and Kelani Jordan all made their cases as to why they’re going to walk out of NXT Stand and Deliver as the new NXT Women’s North American Champion! Speaking of that Title, it was time for another Qualifying Match as Lola Vice took on Tatum Paxley in order to try and qualify for Saturday’s Ladder Match! This is the first time Lola Vice has wrestled for quite a while it feels like, but she looked decent here against an opponent in Tatum Paxley that always does good work! There was a particular part of the match I liked where Tatum hid under the ring and then pulled Lola’s shoulder into the metal under the ring, that was very clever, but it didn’t end up serving Pax too well as Vice delivered a back fist to get the win and book her ticket to Las Vegas!

Grade: C+

Giulia cut her video promo in Japanese, highlighting how Stephanie Vaquer never gave her a rematch for the NXT Women’s Championship, and that the Title means more than friendship! Ava then confirmed that there’d be a Triple Threat Tag Team Match at Stand and Deliver, but Roxanne Perez wasn’t impressed by this so the NXT General Manager said she’d make it into a Fatal 4-Way if Roxanne could find a partner! It was then time to determine the Number 1 Contender’s for the NXT Tag Team Championships as we had ourselves a Gauntlet Match! The contest started off with Hank and Tank taking on Tyson Dupont and Tyriek Igwe, and the recent story has been about how Hank and Tank act like different teams and lose because of it. However, here they breezed past Tyson and Tyriek, winning in around 2 minutes before The Culling entered the fray! Brooks Jensen and Niko Vance did a decent job here, the one move where they dropped Hank face-first onto the announce table looked nasty, but a roll-up saw the demise of those two! The No Quarter Catch Crew were then out next as Myles Borne and Tavion Heights delivered the best contest of all, very much looking like a team that deserves to be on Stand and Deliver! However, that won’t be the case this year as Walker and Ledger were able to deliver another 3 count before Josh Briggs and Yoshiki Inamura entered as the final team! Now, I don’t think the ending went fully to plan here, with Inamura being slightly too late to break up a pin attempt, but the result was still as expected as Hank and Tank ran the Gauntlet to set themselves up with a date against FRAXIOM! I’m very excited for that match, it should be a lot of fun!

Grade: B-

Parking Lot Brawl, Karmen Petrovic VS ?: NXT Women’s North American Championship Qualifying Match

Ava told Mr. Stone and Stevie Turner that she has found a mystery opponent for the final NXT Women’s North American Championship Qualifying Match before Jaida Parker returned home to Port St. Lucie, Florida, to get herself ready for her upcoming NXT Women’s Championship shot! The D’Angelo Family then arrived at the NXT Parking Lot, but without Tony D’Angelo as Channing “Stacks” Lorenzo revealed that he went over The Don’s head with this decision! We then got a manic brawl between The D’Angelo Family and Darkstate, wrecking everything from cars in the Parking Lot to walls in the NXT Archives, but the odds were then “evened” again when Tony D showed up with a crowbar! Eventually, Darkstate disappeared as D’Angelo was furious with Stacks for not listening to him! However, Tony also confirmed that whilst all of this was going on, D’Angelo had gotten The Family a match with Darkstate for NXT Stand and Deliver! I thought this segment was filmed well.

Grade: C+

Stephanie Vaquer was the final woman in the NXT Women’s Championship Match to have her own video promo as La Primera went home to Chile to represent NXT in her homeland! Hank and Tank were then excited as Nathan Frazer was once again rude to them before Roxanne Perez looked to have failed to find a Tag Team partner, only for Cora Jade to walk in! After this segment, it was confirmed that the Fatal 4-Way Tag Team Elimination Match will take place on the Stand and Deliver Kickoff Show, and I cannot believe that that is Roxanne’s WrestleMania Weekend moment! Andre Chase was then telling a couple of his students that he didn’t want to start mentoring them after ruining everyone else’s lives, but this is when Thea Hail walked in to tell Mr. Chase to go for it! Thea then made her way down to the ring to make her NXT return as she went one-on-one with Karmen Petrovic for a spot in Saturday’s NXT Women’s North American Championship Ladder Match! Amazingly, this match did not go very long as Thea dominated Karmen, locking in the Kimura to get an easy victory! I mean, this is a shame for Petrovic because she’s been doing some decent work recently, but this made Hail look like a machine! I expect Saturday’s Ladder Match to be complete and utter chaos, but in the best possible way!

Grade: C+

Oba Femi, Trick Williams, and Je’Von Evans Close the Show

The closing angle heading into NXT Stand and Deliver saw Oba Femi, Trick Williams, and Je’Von Evans all get their final say in heading into the biggest show of the year! Trick Williams started the segment off by saying that he is still Trick Williams and that he is the man that’s going to take back his NXT Championship on Saturday before Oba Femi came out and laughed this claim off, telling Trick that after Saturday, they’re both moving on! Je’Von Evans then arrived and told Williams to shut up, saying he wanted to focus on Femi and how great he has truly been. Despite all of that, though, Je’Von has dropped The Ruler twice, and it’s his turn to hold NXT Gold! This made Femi laugh as Oba called Evans a “child” before a brawl broke out between the three of them, resulting in The Young O.G. dropping both men to once again stand tall! All this segment did was make it a whole lot clearer as to who's walking out of Stand and Deliver as the NXT Champion!

Credit: WWE

Grade: C+