NXT TakeOver: First North American Champion Crowned in New Orleans

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Six of NXT’s finest superstars battled it out in a ladder match to open NXT TakeOver: New Orleans. Who left the chaos as the first ever North American Champion?

Boy, it didn’t take long for things to get crazy in NOLA. NXT TakeOver: New Orleans kicked off with a six-man ladder match to crown the inaugural North American Champion. EC3, Killian Dain, Adam Cole (baybay), Lars Sullivan, Velveteen Dream, and Ricochet laid it all on the line to win the gold. But who came out literally on top? Check out highlights from the match and find out.

It didn’t take long for The One and Only Ricochet to introduce himself to the handful of fans who were unaware of his reputation. With Dain and Sullivan on the arena floor, Ricochet took to the skies with a springboard shooting star press.

Sullivan bounced back, though, demonstrating his amazing raw strength with a pop up slam on Cole.

Sullivan continued his path of destruction by taking out anything that moved with a ladder. It was an awesome display, eventually stopped by a four-person powerbomb off the ladder.

There were no shortages of amazing moments in this one. Adam Cole’s superkick party – including one to a flying Ricochet – was highlight reel worthy. So was the buckle bomb EC3 delivered to Dream. How about Dain’s Vader Bomb onto a ladder – that was laying on top of EC3?

But what really took the cake was Dream dropping a bunch of Purple Rainmakers – with the big one on Sullivan coming from the top of a ladder in the corner. Dream got higher than the championship hanging above the ring!

But, unsurprisingly, the star of the show was Ricochet. Absolutely shining in his debut match, he “reversed” getting thrown off a ladder into a moonsault to the outside. The man is ridiculous, it shouldn’t be possible to do these things.

Ricochet was on the receiving end of some of the craziness, too. Velveteen Dream had the bright idea to do a Death Valley Driver onto a horizontal ladder, taking The One and Only out for a bit.

Dream and EC3 took the brunt of Sullivan’s Freak Accident – from the apron, onto a ladder.

Not to be outdone, Dain followed up with a sitout slam, dumping Cole onto Ricochet – again, thorough a ladder.

Ricochet put himself in a great position to win after a crazy avalanche neckbreaker to Dream from the top of a ladder. He followed it up by flying in out of nowhere to knock Sullivan off a ladder and clear a path to the championship above.

But in swept Adam Cole – you never hear a ghost coming. Cole dumped Ricochet off the ladder to the arena floor, and grabbed the gorgeous new championship for himself.

So Adam Cole becomes the inaugural NXT North American Champion. Honestly, there was no one I couldn’t see winning this one, that’s how wide open it was. And in perhaps the best TakeOver match to date, Cole comes out on top in his first of two matches on the night.

Next: NXT TakeOver: New Orleans Live Review

How do you follow that match up? It’s going to be a great edition of NXT TakeOver, as usual. What are your thoughts on the ladder match, and Cole as champion?