NXT Macon, GA, live results: Drew McIntyre vs. Andrade Almas

Submitted by reader Jeremy S.

– No Way Jose defeated Fabian Aichner

No Way Jose is basically the epitome of an opening match in the best way possible. He got the crowd going by dancing through the floor seats and interacting directly with as many people as he could. Aichner had little impression on the fans and the match was very basic. Half of it was Aichner using a rest hold, then Jose got the win with his pop-up punch.

– Sarah Logan & Lacey Evans defeated Sonya Deville & Mandy Rose

Deville and Rose have both clearly improved, but this was still very basic with the traditional formula of the heel team beating up the faces and then the faces getting a hot tag to pick up the win. Deville and Rose didn’t use very many heel antics and the crowd didn’t have much to react to.

The hot tag ended up getting a good response after the heels worked on Logan. Evans pretty much won the match herself from there, pinning Rose with her reverse piledriver finisher.

– Johnny Gargano defeated Dan Matha

The crowd reacted to Gargano like a star, but they didn’t know who Matha was. They had a David vs. Goliath match that worked very well, with Matha doing power moves and getting heat from the fans. Matha blocked the Gargano Escape by being too powerful for Gargano to take him down, but Gargano hit three superkicks in quick succession (the last one was the kneeling down variant) for the victory.

– Christy St. Cloud was the hostess for the show and would interact with the crowd between matches, but she was interrupted by Zelina Vega here in a continuation from this week’s episode of NXT. Vega reminded us that Drew McIntyre had agreed to defend his title against Andrade “Cien” Almas at any time or place.

Vega mentioned Adam Cole getting a title shot at a house show in San Antonio the night before TakeOver: War Games, saying Almas is not going to wait in line and setting up a McIntyre vs. Almas match for this show’s main event.

– Roderick Strong defeated Hideo Itami

This was surprisingly short, though they packed a lot of action into the match. Itami was still demanding that everyone show him respect and being a heel, with the crowd very clearly wanting to cheer for him. That made for a strange dynamic at times. Strong ended up winning clean with the End of Heartache.

– The Undisputed Era (Adam Cole, Bobby Fish & Kyle O’Reilly) defeated SAnitY (Eric Young, Alexander Wolfe & Killian Dain)

A good portion of the crowd weren’t invested in The Undisputed Era at the start and didn’t seem to know much about them. SAnitY were more over and the crowd was chanting for Young early and often.

The match was pretty good. Fish rolled up Alexander Wolfe while pulling his tights after a chaotic sequence of events. The crowd loved it, and the fans who didn’t know the Undisputed Era had a good idea of who they were after this.

– Velveteen Dream defeated Kassius Ohno

Ohno got a good reaction, but Velveteen Dream got a great one. Dream is fantastic with his character work. Ohno did some clever arm work, and Dream did some quality selling by remembering that his arm was hampering him the entire match. Dream hit the flying elbow (using the other arm) to win.

– Nikki Cross defeated Sage Beckett

It felt like the crowd would rather boo Cross than cheer her here, which was strange considering how they reacted to the rest of SAnitY. Beckett got close to no reaction. Cross won by hitting her fisherman neckbreaker.

– NXT Champion Drew McIntyre defeated Andrade “Cien” Almas to retain his title

A tweet from William Regal sanctioning the match was shown. Along with the presence of a camera, that made it easy to believe that there could have possibly been a surprise title change. Cole also interrupted the introductions to cut a promo, saying the result of the match wasn’t going to matter. Cole hyped his title match in San Antonio.

McIntyre and Almas wrestled a worthy main event, with Almas actually climbing the lighting rig at one point to launch an attack on McIntyre. The fans were into it after about the five minute mark and the match built to some dramatic moments, making an upset seem possible. However, McIntyre retained with the Claymore Kick.

McIntyre’s music played very briefly until Cole stepped back out to the ramp and cut a promo about facing him in San Antonio. McIntyre then challenged Cole to a title match right then and there,
despite barely being able to stand after the main event. Cole came to the ring, a referee entered to make it official, and Cole walked off despite the favorable circumstances.

After McIntyre launched some insults and got the crowd chanting, Cole was angry enough to come back and fight. The referee rang the bell to start a title match, but Fish and O’Reilly immediately ran in to put an end to things.

They beat down McIntyre until No Way Jose’s music hit and he flew down for the save, but they beat down Jose instead. Gargano followed and the faces made a brief comeback until The Undisputed Era regained the upper hand. Nikki Cross emerged on the ramp and headed down to make the save, which was a diversion for the rest of SAnitY to sneak in.

A wild brawl with SAnitY ensued, with them running off Fish and O’Reilly. Everyone then hit their finisher on Cole and the faces stood tall to close the show.