WWE makes pit stop in Syracuse on the “Road to WrestleMania”

With WrestleMania 40 less than a week away, WWE superstars made a pit stop at the Upstate Medical Arena at The Oncenter War Memorial on Sunday. Stars like Drew McIntyre, “The American Nightmare” Cody Rhodes, Omos, “The Ring General” Gunther, Finn Bálor, Damien Priest and Rhea Ripley made appearances in front of the Syracuse crowd. 

Gunther and Rhodes faced off in the night’s main event, a Syracuse Street Fight. 

WrestleMania will take place on Saturday, April 6th and Sunday, April 7th in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. 

The event started with Solo Sikoa and Jimmy Uso taking on fan favorite LA Knight. Uso attacked LA Knight, while Solo distracted the referee throughout the match. 

The technique backfired after Uso accidentally fell into the ring trying to attack Knight. The referee saw this and kicked Uso out of the match. Knight then hit Solo with his finishing maneuver, Blunt Force Trauma, and came out victorious. 

After the match, Knight grabbed a microphone and sent a message to his WrestleMania opponent, AJ Styles, claiming Styles would know “whose game this is with everybody saying…” the crowd then chanted his catchphrase, “LA Knight Yeah!”

There were three championship matches. First, Gunther defended his WWE Intercontinental Championship in a fatal four-way match against Shinsuke Nakamura, “Dirty” Dominik Mysterio and “Main Event” Jey Uso. 

The Judgement Day’s Bálor and Priest also defended their Undisputed WWE Tag Team Championships against the New Day’s Kofi Kingston and Xavier Woods. 

Finally, Ripley defended her WWE Women’s World Championship in a triple-threat match against Shayna Baszler and Natalya.

All three champions successfully retained their championships, building momentum towards WrestleMania.

Other matches during this event included New Catch Republic, consisting of Tyler Bate and Pete Dunne, defeating Pretty Deadly’s Kit Wilson and Elton Prince in a tag team match. Michin, Zelina Vega and the “EST of WWE” Bianca Belair also defeated Damage Ctrl’s Kairi Sane, Dakota Kai and the WWE Women’s Champion Iyo Sky in a six-women tag team match. 

Belair went around the arena signing autographs and taking pictures with her biggest fans after the victory.

WWE superstar Omos also made an appearance where his manager, MVP, put $10,000 of his own money on the line to anyone who could lift “The Nigerian Giant” off of his feet. 

Syracuse University alumnus Odyssey Jones accepted the challenge. During the match, the crowd chanted “Let’s Go Orange” to get in Omos’ head. Jones put up a good fight and actually lifted the 7-foot-3, 420-pound giant off his feet, but the referee didn’t see it, as he was distracted by MVP.

Omos was able to come away victorious and Jones left the ring to a standing ovation in his former home.

In the main event, McIntyre faced fan favorite Rhodes in a Syracuse Street Fight. The crowd chanted “we want tables” and went crazy whenever Rhodes took one out. 

McIntyre did not take too kindly to this and kept putting the table under the ring, infuriating the crowd.

Steel chairs, kendo sticks and steel steps were used against Rhodes. Despite being beaten down, the crowd rallied behind “The American Nightmare” and he put McIntyre through a table to win.

After the event ended, Rhodes thanked Syracuse and gave away an Easter egg and part of the broken table as a souvenir for the fans.