Friday Night SmackDown made its way to Edmonton, Alberta, Canada at the Rogers Place arena for quite a notable episode. For starters, Bash in Berlin is in the rear view mirror as SmackDown’s own Bianca Belair and Jade Cargill recaptured the Women’s Tag Team Championships. Not only that, but SmackDown will no longer be airing on Fox for viewers in the United States, as it will be returning to USA Network starting next Friday. USA previously aired the show during the SmackDown LIVE era on Tuesday nights between 2016 and 2019. Anywho, let’s get started!
We start off with Pretty Deadly brushing Tiffany Stratton’s hair in the locker room, once again mentioning the premiere of “Pretty Deadly: The Musical”, but in walks WWE Women’s Champion and Queen of the Ring Nia Jax to seemingly confront Stratton. Jax mentions that the rest of the women’s division believes the Buff Barbie was going to turn on her last week, which to Jax, is a stupid thing to believe. Stratton says that she was only out there to help her queen, and accuses Chelsea Green of spreading this speculation around the locker room and being jealous of the friendship that Stratton and Jax have. Tiffany would never lie to Nia! Offering her champion friend to accompany her to her match against Bayley later, Jax accepts, stating she’ll be in her corner and help her the same way Stratton did last week.
Immediately following the segment, Bayley makes her way out to the ring for their match, followed by Tiffany. The two lock up to start with, with the Role Model focusing on hurting Stratton’s arm early on.
Stratton would start taking control, unleashing a series of strikes targeting different areas of Bayley’s body. Nia made her way out to watch the match, distracting both competitors and leading to an unsuccessful Bayley-to-Belly attempt. Jax’s attempts to give her bestie a pep talk would result in her being the victim of a suicide dive from Bayley, and trying to distract referee Jessika Carr would lead to the former Women’s Champion reversing a backslide into a Rose Plant on Stratton for the victory.
Elektra Lopez was featured in a Legado Del Fantasma vignette where Santos Escobar reminded Los Garza (Angel and Berto) following their victory last week that they don’t find success, they make it, with Lopez adding that everything is finally falling into place with them and that SmackDown is bound to be their turf. The vignette finishes with the four of them doing a toast.
Chelsea Green and Piper Niven are doing their weekly complaining to SmackDown general manager Nick Aldis when Michin enters the room. Green continues to talk, mentioning how fitting is that Michin’s street fight against Nia Jax last week ended with her covered in a trash can, as that is where “trash” goes. Michin bites back and pokes fun at her NXT appearance. Only Aldis can intervene and he makes a match between the both of them for later tonight.
Both women, who according to Michael Cole, are both former TNA Knockouts Champions, entered the ring for a match later on. In a more fast-paced encounter, Michin initially had the advantage before Green would get the upper hand. Michin was noticeably favoring her ribs, which were taped up as a result of last week’s street fight, and commentary additionally mentioned that executing more impactful moves would be painful due to the ribs being damaged. Piper would get up to distract Michin, but she continued to regain her momentum and would take out Green on the outside with another suicide dive. Both Piper and Michin would have a stare down, and while referee Chip Danning wasn’t looking, Michin was thrown back into the ring, where Green would hit an Un-pretty-her for the win.
A Progressive Match Flo video package aired recapping the Women’s Tag Team Championship match between The Unholy Union and the team of Bianca Belair and Jade Cargill at Bash in Berlin. They’ll be facing The Unholy Union again on Raw next Monday night, and if they can retain, they’ll walk into SmackDown’s new home of the USA Network as the Women’s Tag Team Champions.
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