Friday Night SmackDown aired tonight from inside the Enterprise Center in St. Louis, Missouri, only three weeks away from WrestleMania 42.
The first sighting of the women was the match between Rhea Ripley and Michin, flanked by B-Fab. Ripley immediately let out a beating on Michin to begin, as Ripley’s WrestleMania opponent, the WWE Women’s Champion, Jade Cargill, arrived in no time. The distraction allowed Michin to take control throughout the commercial break, but Ripley would retaliate with a suplex, followed by the two exchanging a series of punches and chops. As the match continued, both women became noticeably groggy, with the match ending after Ripley made Michin submit.
B-Fab and Cargill then charged into the ring to once again attack Ripley, only this time, IYO SKY came to her friend’s rescue, and sent the trio out of the ring.
Later backstage, both Rhea, holding a bag of ice on her neck, and IYO, were in good spirits when Cathy Kelley walked in to interview them, questioning if SKY’s involvement was a proactive attempt at evening the odds against Cargill and her lackeys ahead of The Grandest Stage of Them All. Ripley said that week after week, Jade has proved to her that she can’t do this on her own, but what Jade didn’t think was that she would have a backup plan. The difference between Jade and her is that Jade has followers, while she has friends like IYO, a best friend who will always have her back no matter what. Ripley agrees with SKY’s words, stating that when they’re together, they are bloody unstoppable, and that is exactly why when it comes to WrestleMania, she’ll be walking out the new WWE Women’s Champion.
Cathy later interviewed Bayley and Lyra Valkyria, asking Bayley how meaningful it was to have the opportunity to compete for the Women’s Tag Team Championship at WrestleMania when she was robbed of it the year before by Becky Lynch. Bayley said that losing that opportunity sucked, but she’s built a career off fighting with her back against the wall, so tonight, Charlotte Flair and Alexa Bliss are going to pay for taking that opportunity away, as they had failed to defeat The Irresistible Forces earlier this week on Raw due to yet again more chaos between the tag teams. The Role Model adds that the two will also pay for taking away their opportunity to walk into WrestleMania as Women’s Tag Team Champions, and tonight, they’ll get a little taste of what they’re going to do in Las Vegas.
Valkyria says that Charlotte and Alexa’s friendship seems surface level at best. If they had been through any of what they’ve been through this past year, there’s no way they’d still be teaming today, and adds that this year, it’s more than just about friendship or even gold, but making up for what happened to Bayley last year, and making everything they’ve been through this past year worth it.
Bayley and Valkyria then squared off with Alexa and Charlotte in the second and final women’s match of the night. Things were fast paced to begin between Flair and Valkyria, but it was the tandem of Flair and Bliss during the commercial break who took their turns with The Bird Lady, who struggled to tag in Bayley.
Valkyria was finally able to hit a crossbody onto Flair, and finally got to tag Bayley, who immediately unleashed some offense on her fellow Horsewoman. Flair then fought back with a chop as Bayley was on the turnbuckles, but an assist from Lyra in stopping Alexa from interfering didn’t get them the win just yet; in fact, Flair kicked out several times. As Valkyria was about to jump off the turnbuckles, she was perfectly caught by Flair into the Figure Eight, flustering her, but Bayley stopped it in time, only for Bliss to dropkick her.
The end of the match came when Bayley soon got up to try and stop Bliss from hitting Sister Abigail on Valkyria, but Flair would hit a big boot onto Bayley while Bliss hit a right hand on Valkyria. Bliss and Flair then hit a double Natural Selection on their opponents to win. Unfortunately, Lash Legend and Nia Jax attacked, and this week’s recipient of their double-team leg drop was Bayley.
The Bella Twins did not appear, mentioned by commentary as being absent due to Nikki’s ankle injury; she will be in rehab, but is still expected to participate with Brie against the three other teams at WrestleMania.
Friday Night SmackDown airs next week from inside the SAP Center in San Jose, California, although no women’s matches or segments are currently scheduled as of this writing.
As always, make sure to share your thoughts on this week’s episode of SmackDown in the comments below.