Splitting Up The IIconics Was Peyton Royce's Idea

With many a wrestling fan having been in disbelief at WWE's decision to split up the IIconics last August, it turns out that Cassie Lee, aka Peyton Royce, was the one who suggested she and Billie Kay/Jess McKay split.

Speaking to Chris Van Vliet (as per WrestlingNews.co), Lee revealed how she pitched the break-up of this most beloved tandem as she wanted to try her hand in the singles ranks.

As Cassie detailed:

"I hope Jess isn't upset with me saying this. I wanted to go single. There were things I wanted to take off my bucket list as a singles competitor. I vocalised that to Jess in January last year, but I didn't do anything about it. I told her where I was at. I didn't go and try and get us broken up or something like that. This was in the PC era, and Jess was out for a week. I had this random singles match. I don't even remember who it was against. Vince loved it. He said, 'You're good. What are we doing? I said to him, 'If it is possible in the future plans, and I'm not saying right now, but in the future, I would like to see what I can do on my own. I'm so comfortable with Jess. I feel we can conquer the world together, but I want to see what I can do for myself'."

The pairing of Royce and Kay were forced to split up after losing to the Riott Squad on the 31 August 2020 episode of Raw. By October, Kay was drafted to SmackDown, where she would eventually end up teaming with Carmella. As for Peyton, she'd remain on Raw and soon be put in a makeshift tag team with Lacey Evans.

Both Peyton Royce and Billie Kay would be a part of WWE's post-WrestleMania 37 mass releases.

That noise you can hear in the distance? That's Adam Wilbourn screaming into the ether at having to relive the IIconics' break-up all over again...