You didn’t think WWE would move NXT to Tuesday night and not start it off with a bang, did you?
Indeed, this week’s show, the first after moving to its new night, featuring Santos Escobar issuing an open challenge for his Cruiserweight championship. This after he just defeated Jordan Devlin in a ladder match to become the undisputed champ at TakeOver: Stand & Deliver. That same event featured Kushida losing to Pete Dunne.
Still, he answered the call and the two delivered a barnburner of a match.
.@EscobarWWE is absolutely RUTHLESS against @KUSHIDA_0904! #WWENXY pic.twitter.com/ErkqVgj4cW
— WWE (@WWE) April 14, 2021
But while Escobar looked poised to keep his run going, Kushida surprised everyone by reversing a rollup and scoring the three count to become the new champion.
IS THIS REAL LIFE?! @KUSHIDA_0904 has defeated @EscobarWWE to become the NEW #Cruiserweight Champion in an #OpenChallenge. #AndNew #WWENXT pic.twitter.com/TMTfol8WtQ
— WWE (@WWE) April 14, 2021
This could simply be a way to free up Escobar to move on to bigger and better things. Kushida, meanwhile, rebounds from his most recent loss and should be giving a lot of guys a lot of very good matches.
Speaking of which, Devlin made sure to set up a future match with the new champ.
Get complete NXT results and coverage of this week’s show right here.