Three things WWE got wrong at NXT TakeOver: Stand and Deliver Night 2

As a combined event, it’s hard to look at NXT TakeOver: Stand and Deliver as anything other than a success. When you split the event into two nights, however, one part clearly outshined the other, and night two, unfortunately, drew the short end quality-wise.

As mentioned in another piece, the second leg of Stand and Deliver wasn’t a “worst pay-per-view of the year” contender, but it underwhelmed compared to its night one counterpart.

But where did night two specifically go wrong? Well, that’s what we’re here to discuss.

These are the three things WWE got wrong on night two of NXT TakeOver: Stand and Deliver

3. NXT Women’s Tag Team Championship match

This match, which featured NXT Women’s Tag Team Champions Ember Moon and Shotzi Blackheart defend their belts against The Way’s Candice LeRae and Indi Hartwell, was an ok undercard match, but it fell well short of the standards set by the previous night’s show (and most other TakeOver matches).

Outside of a flurry from Moon following a hot tag and a double Eclipse to LeRae and Hartwell, nothing really stood out about this one from a positive standpoint. The work wasn’t terrible — Moon, Blackheart, and LeRae are very good workers and they mostly masked the still-green Hartwell’s limitations — but it’s usually not good when the main takeaway from a tag match is that one of the participants (Moon) should be a top contender for the NXT Women’s Championship instead of working ho-hum tag matches.

Also, this match served as yet another reminder that LeRae is miscast as a heel.

2. Bronson Reed fails to win the North American Championship

So, two members of The Way lose their title match and another wins theirs later in the evening. Don’t you just love 50/50 booking?

Yes, you can argue that Bronson Reed is protected by having to wrestle two matches in one night. And sure, you can say that Austin Theory’s constant interference and the fact that Johnny Gargano needed to hit his One Final Beat DDT twice to secure the victory keeps Reed from looking too weak. But do you know what else would’ve made Reed look strong: Having him win the NXT North American Championship!

If this were any other promotion, you could expect Reed to get rehabbed with a winning streak and a few other meaningful wins before getting another crack at the North American Championship. But in WWE, even NXT, there’s an equal chance of him fading to the background, which makes this a lost opportunity.

1. Adam Cole and Kyle O’Reilly’s attempt at crafting an epic.

Let’s get this out of the way: Kyle O’Reilly and Adam Cole are great workers who worked hard on Thursday night to create a WWE version of their past wars in Ring of Honor in their Unsanctioned match. However, their quest to put together a masterpiece resulted in a final product that was too cute in some spots, too illogical in others, and too long altogether.

Yes, Cole and O’Reilly came up with some great spots — Cole using a chain to clothesline O’Reilly and Cole breaking up a triangle choke by driving a tire iron into O’Reilly’s ribs, for example. And yes, the finish — O’Reilly hitting a chain-wrapped knee drop onto Cole, who was slightly propped up by a wedged open chair — matched the bout’s brutal billing.

But following the unnecessary ref bump, which only served to make Cole look like a moron, it felt the two were filling time, not building to an exciting climax. It didn’t help that the announcers tried to make this sound far more violent than it actually was.

This was a solid main event, but given the hype and the other matches that took place during the two nights, it fell a little flat.