The May 13, 2020 episode of WWE NXT aired live on the USA Network from the Winter Park, Florida at Full Sail University.
The show was headlined by Matt Riddle vs. Timothy Thatcher in a singles match after working the opening contest.
WWE NXT Results (5/13)
- Imperium (Marcel Barthel & Fabian Aichner) def. Matt Riddle & Timothy Thatcher for NXT Tag Team Titles
- Tegan Nox def. Indi Hartwell
- Jake Atlas def. Tony Nese
- Cameron Grimes def. Finn Balor
- Kayden Carter defeated Aliyah
- Matt Riddle def. Timothy Thatcher.
Here are the takeaways from this week’s show:
Rhea Ripley Speaks
WWE had Rhea Ripley do a promo on this show about her issues with NXT Women’s Champion Charlotte Flair.
This is where she did backstage and talked about how she has been thinking about dropping the title to Flair since it happened and it makes her sick. She said that Io Shirai didn’t get the job done and that she considers herself as the person to do it.
Ripley said that she’s willing to beat that belief into Io. He ended the promo by stating that the title belongs to her.
This segment comes after Ripley’s return to NXT television on last week’s episode of NXT when Charlotte Flair put the NXT Women’s Title on the line when she defended it against the #1 contender in Io Shirai.
Flair hit her with a kendo stick, which led to a post-match attack, and Ripley making the save. Up until this point, Ripley had been off WWE programming since dropping the title to Flair at WrestleMania 36.
The Major Announcement Is…
On Wednesday, WWE had WWE NXT General Manager William Regal to appear on WWE The Bump digital show to announce that there will be a major announcement on NXT.
It was later revealed that WWE Hall of Famer Triple H and Shawn Michaels would make the announcement. So what was the announcement?
It turns out that WWE had Road Dog Triple H and Michaels in the control room where they announced that on June 7 on the WWE network there will be an NXT TakeOver: In Your House special. This will be to celebrate the 25 Anniversary of the first In Your House PPV event.
Road Dog kept bringing up Triple H working the first WWE In Your House PPV event against Henry Godwin. This was supposed to be a comedy segment.
A cool announcement but from right now, WWE has less than a month to build up to this special event even though they just had a stacked card last week with their top two programs for the top two titles on the brand.
NXT Tag Team Title Match
Imperium’s Marcel Barthel and Fabian Aichner vs. NXT Tag Team Champion Matt Riddle and partner Timothy Thatcher took place with the titles on the line.
This was one of the top matches advertised in advance for the show but served as the opening contest.
It was a fine match with all four stars working hard and putting on an entertaining bout. Thatcher got accidentally kicked in the head by Riddle so he walked out on Riddle. The finish saw Imperium hit their finisher for the win and to win the NXT Tag Team Titles.
WWE had set up this contest a few weeks ago during a segment with Riddle and Thatcher, who were doing a date show parody in order for Thatcher to get to know Riddle better now that he’s filling in for Pete Dunne as Dunne is stuck in the UK due to the virus.
Riddle and Thatcher got into a scuffle backstage that led to them working the main event.
Finn Balor’s Attacker
Finn Balor vs. Cameron Grimes in a singles match is in the books after a one-week build.
Grimes actually won the contest thanks to a distraction from Damian Priest. After the match, Priest beat Balor down. Priest revealed that he was the one who attacked Balor three weeks ago.
WWE was still playing up the angle of who attacked Balor up until now. Balor did a great promo last week about wanting to find the attacker. When Grimes popped off in a promo moments later about how he would slap Balor, the former NXT Champion took him out.
The belief was that WWE would be stringing fans along to find out who the actual attacker is. However, that’s the case.
Priest just got done with a program with Keith Lee so pushing him right to Balor shows how highly NXT officials think of him.
