Written by Wayne Mason

Photos by Maryann Mason

A lively crowd packed into The Minnreg Hall in Largo to see their favorite stars of NXT. Fans would not be disappointed as the young and hungry athletes gave them another highly charged night of wrestling action.

The action kicks off with Chad Gable taking another shot at Solomon Crowe. The two evenly matched athletes know each other well as they lock up trading off armbars and jockeying for an advantage. Eventually the Olympian finds an opening and takes charge targeting the arm of Crowe with a series of armbars including a nasty one over the ring ropes. The explosive Solomon Crowe mounts a quick comeback with a series of chops and strikes followed by a running knee in the corner. He continues his attack dropkicking Gables feet out from under him setting up the Stretch Muffler giving Gable no choice but to tap. After the match, Ty Dillinger comes out and scores it a 5. It was a great opening match featuring guys who are two of my top pick to look out for in 2015. Gable has shown versatility as both a heel and a face, but is doing really well as a cocky Olympian bad guy.

Up next is a six-womens tag match as the team of Alexa Bliss, Carmella, and Devin Taylor take on Becky Lynch, Dasha, and Dana Brooke. The match starts and almost immediately the good girls start strong staying one step ahead of their opponents. But with a helpful distraction Lynch is able to get the upper hand on Alexa. They punish Bliss while making frequent tags until she eventually makes a hot tag to Carmella who comes in and clears the ring. With the other girls ejected from the ring Carmella drops an advancing Brooke with a drop-toe hold and wraps her up in her head scissor submission for the second tap-out victory of the night. Ty Dillinger gives the match a 3. As the more experienced wrestler Becky Lynch did a good job of conducting traffic here, while Carmella just gets better with every match. A good outing for the rookie Dasha too, who seems to have all the tools.

Announcer Greg Hamilton makes his way to the ring and introduces Dylan Miley. Standing at around 6’3” and weighing around 285 lbs Miley is an imposing figure. Of course, his most memorable attribute may be his incredibly large hands. Hamilton asks him what the future holds for him. Miley explains that the future is molded by the hands of time and tells him to look at his hands. He continues saying these hands will do exactly what they want to do, the clock is ticking and it is almost time. Miley is pretty good on the mic and unfazed by hecklers in the crowd. I’m looking forward to seeing the big man compete, and hoping that he uses a claw hold.

The action continues with the deranged Marcus Louis taking on Bull Dempsey. The two approach each other slowly and first and then lock up, Dempsey throwing Louis into a side headlock which the Frenchman eventually broke only to get chopped and thrown back into it. Eventually Louis fights back and takes the upper hand. He stalks Dempsey slowly and methodically. The tortured Louis has been more of a brawler since he has lost it, and beats Bull down with big clubbing blows. Finally Dempsey comes back though with a series of strikes, a headbutt and a butt drop. He follows by absolutely running Louis down. Usually this is where he sets up his flying headbutt, but tonight he surprisingly went right for the pin and got the 1-2-3 victory. Afterwards, an irate Marcus Louis attacked Dempsey until several referees broke them up. Bull is really starting to get over with fans and I still believe he can be a really good face. As usual Marcus Louis is absolutely great as the tortured monster.

Next is Tyler Breeze taking on Baron Corbin. The match starts off fast paced as Breeze tries to figure out the best way to take on the much larger angrier Corbin. Despite some early offense Corbin beats him down and follows with some of his signature offense. Breeze had flurries of comebacks but by large Corbin dominated. In the final moments Breeze dodges the big boot of Corbin and answers with a superkick. The two make it to their feet and rock each other with back and forth blows until Breeze hits Corbin with another superkick followed by a Beauty Shot for the win. Ty Dillinger only gave it a 3, even though the crowd was hot and it clearly stole the show. Corbin seems more comfortable as a heel, and his in ring performance really seems to be benefitting from his string of more high profile matches. Tyler Breeze who is mostly cheered anyway seems to be playing to the fans more, even taking selfies with the crowd.

Next, the womens title is up for grabs as Sasha Banks defends her title against Bayley. The match starts off at a fast pace with plenty of reversals until Banks eventually takes charge grounding Bayley with a straightjacket crossface. She continues to dominate Bayley eventually setting up Bayley in the corner for a second diving kneedrop which Bayley dodges. The underdog fires back with a frenzied flurry of her signature spots. She attempts to set up Banks up for a Belly-To-Bayley but Banks spins her around for a backstabber followed by a Bank Statement for a submission victory. This was yet another great outing between these two and another highlight of the night, but yet Ty Dillinger only gave it a 6.

In a non-title tag match The Mechanics took on Blake and Murphy. These two evenly matched teams traded off offense in the early goings but it was Murphy who stayed a step ahead initially until the wily Mechanics took advantage and took over cutting off Blake from his partner. They continued to punish him with frequent tags and great tandem offense until he makes the hot tag to Murphy. The Aussie is simply explosive when he hits the ring taking out anything that moves. However, with the ref distracted The Mechanics took advantage with Dawson flapjacking Murphy into Wilders knees and taking the pin. NXT tag division is great all around but these are your top two teams at the moment, and they are the teams that need to meet at the next live special.

Kevin Owens comes out to a huge pop for a hilarious segment as he berates a kid in the audience wearing a Sami Zayn T-shirt. He tells him that Sami is not here tonight, that he is at home resting after the beating he gave him to take his title. He tells the kid to take off his shirt, march over and buy a Kevin Owens shirt or he is leaving. Owens gives the kid a count of ten to do so, which he doesn’t and Kevin Owens leaves the ring and head to the back.

Ty Dillinger is out next to give us a perfect 10 performance. His opponent is Jason Jordan, who now once again has Shoot Nation entrance music. The match starts with some nice grappling, with Dillinger taking time between each lock-up to hold up his scorecard. After some comedic antics the action starts and Ty attacks viciously but Jordan comes back with some serious power moves including a resounding fallaway slam. Ty dodges a spear and answers with a firemans carry. Jordan rebounds with an overhead belly-to-belly suplex followed by an emphatic Olympic slam for the victory. Not a perfect 10, but a pretty good performance by both men.

The main event of the evening is Enzo Amore and Big Cass taking on The Vaudevillians in front of a very split crowd. Gotch and English start off strong with plenty of manliness and leg squats. Cass and Zo answer with some signature offense of their own. Eventually The Vaudevillians isolate Enzo, who is at his best when playing the underdog. Finally he makes the hot tag to Cass who comes in and clears the ring of Gotch. He then follows with a swinging side slam to English followed with an assisted splash from Amore for the pin. It was an entertaining match that gave the crowd exactly what they love about both teams.



































































