Thea Hail details how Thunder Rosa helped her get WWE NXT tryout

An assist from AEW star Thunder Rosa helped Thea Hail land her job with WWE NXT.

In an interview with Pittsburgh City Paper before NXT Great American Bash, Hail detailed how she got signed by WWE while still finishing high school. Hail said that, after facing Thunder Rosa on AEW Dark in 2021, Rosa helped get her in touch with a WWE recruiter. Hail was invited to a WWE tryout and then offered an NXT contract.

The 20-year-old Hail told City Paper that she grew up watching old wrestling reruns with her father. When she was a teenager, Hail saw a clip of Rey Mysterio on Instagram and realized that wrestling was what she wanted to do as a career. She told her father and he helped her find a training school.

“I quit gymnastics, I quit cheer. I had no clue what I wanted to do with my life, and I was just scrolling through Instagram, and I always follow WWE. I always thought it was amazing, but I never really thought it was a thing you could do,” Hail said. “I saw this video of Rey Mysterio, and I just put my phone down, and went, ‘I’m doing that.’

“[My father] found me a training school in Pittsburgh called the Stronghold Training Center, and then that was combined with the Iron City Wrestling Academy, and I trained at both of those schools. I ended up landing a dark match for AEW after having a seminar with QT Marshall, and I wrestled Thunder Rosa, and she got me in contact with a recruiter from WWE.”

Hail wrestled two Dark matches for AEW in 2021, using Nikita Knight as her wrestling name.

After signing with WWE, Hail debuted on NXT as a member of Chase U. She’s challenging Roxanne Perez for the NXT Women’s Championship at Great American Bash tonight. It’s a two-week television special where — due to the Olympics — both episodes are airing on Syfy.