It took a couple of tries but finally Io Shirai has won the NXT Women’s champion, dethroning Charlotte Flair last night at NXT Takeover: In Your House in a triple threat match that also included former champion Rhea Ripley.
Shirai arrived in WWE in 2018, participating in the second Mae Young Classic tournament and then joined the NXT brand where she had some pretty amazing matches but always came up short when the NXT Women’s title was involved. But that changed yesterday at Takeover in a near 20-minute main event match with the ending coming when Flair had Ripley in the Figure Eight but Shirai hit the moonsault on Ripley while she was still locked in Flair’s move and covered her for the pin.
The Genius of the Sky then got her traditional Japanese celebration with confetti and streamers flying in from everywhere as the new champ posed with the title in the middle of the ring.
Io became the third Japanese superstar to win the NXT Women’s title following in the footsteps of Asuka and Kairi Sane.
