Rey Mysterio advances in United States Championship Invitational

Austin Theory needed a new challenger for the United States championship so Triple H did what Triple H does and he booked two multi-man matches, in this case Fatal 4-Ways, as a mini-tournament WWE decided to call the “United States Championship Invitational.” The winners of the two 4-Way matches would meet in a singles bout to determine who would go on to challenge Theory.

Santos Escobar won the first one on last week’s episode of Friday Night SmackDown, outlasting AJ Styles, BUTCH, and Grayson Waller.

On this week’s episode of Friday Night SmackDown, LA Knight, Sheamus, Cameron Grimes, and Rey Mysterio came together to determine who will face him next week.

Knight was given some promo time before the match, making clear WWE very much sees him as a star in the making, but that didn’t mean he was going to be winning this match. Sure enough, after everyone took a finish, it was the legendary Mysterio who emerged victorious, after he pinned Grimes.

This came after Theory tried to keep him from winning and Escobar went on the offensive.

Now it’s LWO vs. LWO for the right to get their hands on Theory themselves. The two celebrated together this week and commentary sold hard that it will be “mentor vs. protege” next week.

Get complete SmackDown results and coverage of this week’s show right here.