7 Ups And 3 Downs From WWE WrestleMania 39 Night 1

3. Women Make Pitch For Main Event

WWE WrestleMania 39 Charlotte Flair Rhea Ripley
WWE.com

Back at WrestleMania 23, Batista and Undertaker were given a slot in the middle of the card for their World Heavyweight Championship match. Irate over the placement on the card, the two proceeded to burn the house down with an incredible match, making the case that they should have gone on last.

You got the feeling Saturday night that Charlotte Flair and Rhea Ripley had the same reaction to not main-eventing Night 1 of WrestleMania 39, as they slowly ramped up the aggression and violence in their match for the Queen’s SmackDown Women’s Championship. The match started off slowly, taking a few minutes to get going, but at one point, they just put the foot down on the pedal and started lobbing bombs at each other at an increasing rate.

Flair kicked out of the Riptide. Rhea kicked out of a spear. Both escaped each other’s submissions. Finally, it was an avalanche Riptide that ended Charlotte’s night… and title reign.

This match was everything the United States Championship match wasn’t earlier in the night. It was a statement win for Ripley, a star-making performance that put her on the map as a serious player for some time to come. Kudos to Rhea and to Charlotte for delivering.

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Contributor
Contributor

Scott is a former journalist and longtime wrestling fan who was smart enough to abandon WCW during the Monday Night Wars the same time as the Radicalz. He fondly remembers watching WrestleMania III, IV, V and VI and Saturday Night's Main Event, came back to wrestling during the Attitude Era, and has been a consumer of sports entertainment since then. He's written for WhatCulture for more than a decade, establishing the Ups and Downs articles for WWE Raw and WWE PPVs/PLEs and composing pieces on a variety of topics.