8 Ups And 6 Downs From WWE Evolution

4. Shirai Flies, Storm Shines

io shirai toni storm
WWE.com

Throughout the Mae Young Classic, we kept hearing how Io Shirai is the “Genius of the Sky.” But aside from a couple moves, we didn’t really see a lot of aerial attacks from Io.

That changed Sunday night, when Shirai flew around the ring, hitting a springboard dropkick and following up with a running, leaping moonsault to the floor in rapid succession, followed up by a springboard sunset flip pin attempt later on.

Shirai and Toni Storm had a good but too-brief match, as both showed that they have the chops to take the women’s division into the future. Storm has a charisma about her that will serve her well, and Shirai has the goods to be a multi-time champ.

Let’s hope they get more opportunities to impress fans as they go forward.

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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.