Sol Ruca and Zaria’s Last Woman Standing match was everything I wanted. Violent, personal, dangerous, and emotional.
Matches like these are always hard to recap because they’re basically just two people beating the hell out of each other until one of them can’t move anymore. So instead of going through all of that, I’ll focus on the end.
The match made its way to the NXT perch, via the obligatory spot of both women crashing through it. They stumbled to their feet and kept fighting despite clearly being spent. Zaria set up a table, Sol mounted a comeback, then she set up a table and put Zaria on it. Sol then climbed to the top of the perch with clearly one thing on her mind.
When she looked down, Zaria pulled a Batman and wasn’t there. She magically transported to right behind Sol. Sol leaped over Zaria’s telegraphed attack and the two battled in a very precarious position for what felt like 10 minutes straight. The tension and drama was all about which of them would fall over first. Which of them would push the other over the edge and truly break this sisterhood. Sol got the closest. In fact, she had Zaria dead to rights. But Ms. Ruca fell for her former best friend’s fake apologies.
Zaria didn’t want to go through two tables from that height—who would—so she immediately begged Sol to chill and apologized for everything. For a minute it looked like these two might get back to who they were and maybe they just needed to get this out of their system. Maybe they realized they went too far.
Nope, that’s not what happened. After an emotional embrace, Zaria revealed her true colors and pushed Sol into the tables below. Now, about those tables. I didn’t like how Sol landed. I think the spot called for her to crash through both tables but she only went through one. And from the angle on TV, it looked like her head caught a bit of the edge of the other table. I don’t know if her head actually bounced off the edge but the landing looked very rough. Hopefully she’s OK.
This was Sol’s last match in NXT and it was a doozy. Also the perfect way to go out. She closed one of the territory’s longest running stories in very dramatic fashion. Zaria gets to move forward and start her true solo career while Sol sees what she can do on Raw.
Very dope match on an otherwise standard NXT show.
This was standard NXT fare but with key pieces like Jacy Jayne, Fatal Influence, Jaida Parker, and Kelani Jordan missing. It also officially sent Joe hendry and Sol Ruca packing. This brand shakeup will continue but hopefully things settle soon.
What say you, Cagesiders? Do you prefer the Casket Match or Last Woman Standing?