Friday Night SmackDown aired a pre-recorded episode on Black Friday from inside the Ball Arena in Denver, Colorado, less than 24 hours away from Survivor Series: WarGames.
Cathy Kelley interviewed Damian Priest, his face completely healed but still embroiled in his feud with Aleister Black, when Zelina Vega (now referred to in on-screen graphics as “Zelina”) walked up to him. Vega tells Priest that he keeps promising her and Black all this punishment, but has he ever noticed that he is on the receiving end of all that punishment?
Priest laughs and crouches down to talk to her, asking if her “really really tough husband” sent her to tell him that, but Vega says she’s not doing this for Black, she’s doing this for Priest. Black has his mind on bigger things, but the last time people were talking about Priest was when Aleister burned his face nearly two months ago. If he insists on more punishment, she is sure Black would be happy to oblige; the two wanted to show him how easy it was for them to get to him. Vega walks off after delivering a sinister laugh, but Priest points out to Kelley how the more Black and Vega talk, the less they understand.
Priest then notices a familiar, friendly face, and the camera zooms over to reveal Rhea Ripley, who gives him a hug. With Kelley walking out to give them time to catch up, Priest asks her if she’s ready for WarGames tomorrow, but Ripley already knows the answer to that, clearly in a good mood and confident her team will win. The Eradicator has to leave in order to go hype up Charlotte Flair for her advantage match later, but she wants to run an idea by her former Judgment Day teammate later.
Chelsea Green, the blue brand’s dual Women’s United States Champion and AAA Mixed Tag Team Champion, made her way out for her championship celebration (which was promised last week, but delayed at the last minute) to notable cheers with her Slaygent, Alba Fyre, alongside her.
Inside the ring, covered in the flags of Mexico, the United States, and Canada, Green waved and took the mic to address her “PatriHOTs”, standing before them not only to be crowned, celebrated, and applauded, but to officially enter her second term as “our first and fourth, two-time, most dangerous” Women’s United States Champion. It is an honor to serve as the greatest women’s champion not only in the history of both WWE and the United States, but in the continent of the North Americas.
Asking the fans to raise their voices and flags with a very expensive display of pyrotechnics in her name, Green starts counting down from five, but before that precious pyro can go off, the music of Jade Cargill interrupts, and the WWE Women’s Champion walks out with a vengeance. With Fyre trying to protect Green, the redheaded Slaygent was hit with a boot to the face from Cargill. Green herself barely could get out of the ring before Cargill grabbed her and set her in position to perform Jaded.
Cargill then walked out and held her Women’s Championship in the air as pyro went off, frustrating both Fyre and Green, who threw a hissy fit in the ring over her celebration being ruined.
Alexa Bliss was backstage talking to her tag team partner Charlotte Flair, who says she has no pressure to win the advantage in the women’s WarGames match; she also mentions that the last time she faced Asuka, back in 2023, she tore her ACL, promising to rip her apart tonight and calling Rhea Ripley “mate”, but tells Alexa to relax when Blisster suggests that Ripley might be rubbing off on The Queen.
AJ Lee lastly shows up and says she wasn’t eavesdropping on that conversation. She’s glad that Flair is feeling confident and she is, too, because no matter what happens tonight, she knows they’re going to win tomorrow, saying in a slightly more threatening tone that she’ll make sure of it. Bliss likes Lee’s attitude, and the rest of the team appears to agree with her sentiment.
The show returned a bit later on with Jade Cargill walking backstage when Cathy Kelley ran up to her. Wondering why Cargill attacked Green and Fyre, the roving reporter of Team Blue asked the champion if she had a problem with them, to which Cargill said that she has a problem with anybody who runs their mouth; the attack was a statement to the entire women’s locker room, and if they have a problem with it, they can step up and get stepped on.
Cargill kept going on her way when she ran into B-Fab. With the two former friends being at odds since Cargill’s title win, the champion asked if she had something to say, but walked off as The Fab Female said nothing. Michin ran up to B-Fab and asked if she was okay, not knowing why anybody isn’t checking on Jade’s new attitude. The Hardcore Princess lastly says it might have to be her.
Becky Lynch walked into the locker room to talk to her WarGames teammates, reminding Asuka, Kairi Sane, Nia Jax, and Lash Legend to remember what’s important to the team, and she doesn’t want to shade anybody, but she’s going to, because there’s only one person in the room when it comes to a 100% success rate at WarGames: herself, singling out Nia and Lash for “0 percent” and Asuka for “8 percent”, Asuka having been on the winning side with Lynch in 2022, but not getting the final pin, while Lynch has gotten the pin “10 out of 10 times”, having also won in 2023.
Urging the team to leave it to her when the door of the cage is closed, Jax tells Lynch it’s not about her tonight, it’s about Asuka, and her beating Charlotte Flair and getting the advantage for their team at WarGames. Asuka then briefly talks about how the last time she faced Charlotte, she was out for a whole year afterward. The entire team is in quite the excited mood, at least until Asuka yells out for Kairi, at which point The Pirate Princess must go.
Asuka and Charlotte Flair then fought in a WarGames advantage match, with the stipulation being that the winner of tonight’s match would get to choose a member of their team first to enter the cage during tomorrow night’s big showdown.
The match began with Asuka and Flair trying to counter each other’s attempts to lock up. Flair was able to deliver three kicks to Asuka, targeting her side, abdomen, and face, but The Empress of Tomorrow was unfazed, throwing punches and a kick of her own to The Queen before the show cut to commercials.
After the break, the show returned with Flair and Asuka doing their best to continue countering each other’s offense, but Flair quickly took control climbing to the top turnbuckle for an attempted crossbody, which Asuka rolled through and reversed into a pin that Flair kicked out of. Asuka then hit a series of strikes to her opponent, but Flair still prevailed with a boot once again. After some more punches and chops between the two women, Flair hit Asuka with a clothesline and a fallaway slam, earning cheers from the crowd. The two kept it at a fast pace inside the ring, with both showing the determination to earn a crucial victory.
Using a knee to the face of Flair, Asuka tried to lock in her signature armbar, but Flair was able to muster up enough strength to hit a sitout powerbomb, squashing Asuka flat on the mat, but the Empress kicked out. Frustrated over not putting her away, the action spilled outside the ring, where Flair threw Asuka into the commentary desk. Attempting to walk to try and grab her, Flair ducked when Asuka tried to spit her green mist into her face, instead spitting it into the eyes of the timekeeper, blinding him and shocking her. Flair then slammed Asuka head-first into the commentary desk before throwing her right back into the ring.
Now in the ring again, Flair attempted to put Asuka in the Figure Eight, but Asuka stopped it and tried to reverse it into the Asuka Lock. Flair was able to escape the Asuka Lock using her legs to roll through, and performed Natural Selection on Asuka to finally win the match, meaning that Charlotte’s team will be the ones with the advantage tomorrow night.
Survivor Series: WarGames airs tomorrow night on Saturday, November 29th from Petco Park in San Jose, California. Here is schedule for the event, related programming, and the platforms where you can find it:
- Countdown – 5:00 p.m. Eastern Time / 2:00 p.m. Pacific Time on the ESPN app and WWE’s social media accounts
- Survivor Series: WarGames – 7:00 p.m. Eastern Time / 4:00 p.m. Pacific Time on the ESPN app and Netflix in other countries
- Post-Show – immediately after the main event on the ESPN app and WWE’s social media accounts
- Recap: hosted by Megan Morant and Sam Roberts, available Sunday on WWE’s YouTube channel
As for the actual matches on the show, here’s what you can expect:
- Women’s WarGames match: Rhea Ripley, IYO SKY, Alexa Bliss, Charlotte Flair, and AJ Lee vs. The Kabuki Warriors (Asuka and Kairi Sane), Nia Jax, Lash Legend, and Becky Lynch
- Women’s World Championship: Stephanie Vaquer (c) vs. Nikki Bella
As always, make sure to share your thoughts on this week’s episode of SmackDown, plus your Survivor Series predictions, in the comments below.
