NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 14 Night 2: Results, Grades, and Analysis

Night 1 of NJPW Wrestle Kingdom 14 proved to be an incredible show that saw several big matches tear the house down. From Jon Moxley reclaiming the IWGP US Heavyweight Championship, to Naito winning the IWGP Intercontinental Championship, to Hiromu Takahashi defeating Will Ospreay.

Night 2 looks to continue where Night 1 left of, with a significant stipulation to the main event. The winner of the main event will walk away the first person to ever hold the IWGP Intercontinental Championship and the IWGP Heavyweight Championship at the same time. The winner of this match will go down in history as one of the greatest wrestlers of all time, making Tokyo Dome history as NJPW succeeded in having two shows in a row in the building.

Everything about this is historic for NJPW, but it is not all that is happening. Chris Jericho and Hiroshi Tanahashi go one-on-one in a dream match that has another interesting stipulation: If Hiroshi Tanahashi can defeat Chris Jericho, he will get a shot at the AEW World Championship. Since The Elite left NJPW, the relationship between them and NJPW has been rather cold.

The fact that NJPW has not only used the AEW World Championship for marketing, but AEW has allowed the championship title to appear in hype videos for the match with Tanahashi, indicates that we might be closer to a working agreement than ever. While nothing is set in stone, where NJPW previously never mentioned AEW, it is significant that they are acknowledging them now. Regardless, NJPW has setup a fantastic card that will see two massive main events.

Preshow

Bullet Club (Bad Luck Fale, Yujiro Takahashi, & Chase Owens) vs. CHAOS (Tomohiro Ishii, Robbie Eagles, YOSHI-HASHI) – Gauntlet Match for the NEVER Openweight Six-Man Tag Team Championship

Fale started the match with Eagles, and hit the Grenade early on, but Eagles kicked out. Fale went for the Bad Luck Fall, but Eagles slipped out and sent him into a superkick from YOSHI-HASHI. YOSHI-HASHI nailed Fale with a clothesline to down the big man. Chase Owens and Yujiro were able to get in there quickly and run wild with some tandem offence of Ishii.

Chase Owens went for a package piledriver on Ishii, but Eagles made the save with a kick and then he dived on Fale. Owens and Ishii exchanged a few strikes, as Owens tried to use a V-Trigger, managing to hit one on Ishii, but YOSHI-HASHI superkicked him and Ishii hit a brainbuster on Owens for the pinfall victory.

CHAOS vs. Suzuki-gun (Taichi, Yoshinobu Kanemaru, & El Desperado)

The Suzuki-gun trio immediately jumped Ishii, leaving him laying with several strikes, including an axe bomber. Ishii kicked out and hit a suplex. Taichi dodged a corner charge and kicked Ishii in the face. The other CHAOS men tried to turn it around, but Taichi hit another kick to Chase Owens as well. Ishii and Taichi exchanged some strikes, and both men went down.

Robbie Eagles managed to a missile dropkick on Desperado’s knee. Both moved quickly afterwards, with Desperado hitting an uppercut and tagging out to Kanemaru. Kanemaru hit an inverted DDT for a 2 count that was broken up by YOSHI-HASHI. Kanemaru and Eagles exchanged a series of standing switches that ended with Eagles pinning Desperado.

Los Ingobernables de Japon (EVIL, Shingo, & BUSHI) vs. CHAOS

BUSHI and Eagles started with some lucha spots, ending with BUSHI hitting a dropkick and tagging out to EVIL. EVIL did a corner charge that dropped the smaller man. EVIL hit a bronco buster and tagged out to Shingo who ate the chops from Eagles and followed up with a big chop of his own. Eagles managed to hit a combo of moves before tagging out to YOSHI-HASHI, who immediately hit a Head-hunter on Shingo.

YOSHI-HASHI and Shingo exchanged a series of strikes, ending with YOSHI-HASHI hitting a huge lariat that Shingo got up from and nailed YOSHI-HASHI with one of his own. Both men tagged out and EVIL and Ishii exchanged a series of hard blows. LIJ hit a triple team on Ishii for a 2 count that was broken up by YOSHI-HASHI. BUSHI hit a flipping dive through the middle rope on Eagles.

Ishii blocked Everything is EVIL by EVIL, but got hit with a lariat, and then Darkness Falls. The referee botched the count here and counted to three, leaving CHAOS eliminated. The new ref was way to eager and was clearly not experienced enough. I would have kept him to the Road to shows and off the Tokyo Dome.

LIJ vs. Toru Yano (CHAOS), Togi Makabe (GBH), & Ryusuke Taguchi (Taguchi Japan)

Yano ran in and immediately started rolling people up for near falls and attempted to send several people into the corner of the ring, where he conveniently removed the turnbuckle padding. Makabe beat on BUSHI for a bit, hitting a Northern Lights Suplex for a 2 count. Makabe went for some sort of Full Nelson slam, but BUSHI fought out and tagged Shingo.

Shingo and Makabe exchanged several strikes, hitting double lariat, ending with Makabe killing Shingo with a huge lariat. Taguchi tagged in and went for a hip attack on Shingo, but Shingo hit an atomic drop. Taguchi hit the 3 Amigos suplex and went for another hip attack, but BUSHI dropkicked him in the butt.

Makabe hit the ropes hard and dropped EVIL and Shingo. Taguchi hit the Dodon on Shingo for a 2 count, but Taguchi immediately grabbed an ankle lock. The referee got shoved and BUSHI hit the poison mist on Taguchi. Shingo killed Taguchi with a lariat and then Made in Japan for victory! We have new champions.

Result: LIJ

Rating: **1/2 (2.5 stars)

This was a very solid opening tag that saw LIJ win their first sets of gold of the night. Hiromu Takahashi walked away with the IWGP Jr. Heavyweight Championship, and we might also see SANADA walk away with the RevPro British Heavyweight crown, while Naito could walk away with both top titles in the company. A good star of LIJ that might be a sign of things to come. It looks like LIJ is set to have a huge year in NJPW.