WWE visited that SAP Center in San Jose, California for the TLC event last night. The show marked WWE’s final pay-per-view for 2018, and it looks like two WWE Superstars will be closing out the year with big title wins. Although Ronda Rousey was able to successfully defend her Raw Women’s Championship, Daniel Bryan retained that WWE Championship, Buddy Murphy is still Cruiserweight Champion, and The Bar walked out of the arena with the SmackDown Tag Team Championships, two major title changes still took place during TLC. As seen during last night’s show, fans can now look forward to seeing a brand new SmackDown Women’s Champion and Intercontinental Champion on WWE programming for the foreseeable future.
First off, the Intercontinental Championship changed hands in the penultimate match on TLC. Seth Rollins has defended the IC title for a number of months now against all challengers, but his ongoing feud with Dean Ambrose has become personal. Fans may recall that Ambrose attacked Rollins and turned his back on The Shield on the same night that Roman Reigns also announced that he would be leaving WWE to fight his leukemia. Since then, Ambrose and Rollins have had a war of words on Raw, but it was time for the former tag team titleholders to fight last night. In the end, Dean Ambrose was able to put Rollins away with Dirty Deeds in order to capture the Intercontinental Championship for third time in his career.
#AndNew #WWETLC #ICTitle @TheDeanAmbrose pic.twitter.com/EyF7KGub5r
— WWE (@WWE) December 17, 2018
Cleansed. #WWETLC #AndNew @TheDeanAmbrose pic.twitter.com/lxZzutuTs7
— WWE Universe (@WWEUniverse) December 17, 2018
In the main event of the show, the highly-anticipated TLC match between Charlotte Flair, Asuka, and Becky Lynch for the SmackDown Women’s Championship took place. Lynch’s title was suspended above the ring as the ladies each tried to climb up a ladder in order to retrieve the championship. It seemed as if any of these women could have won throughout various points in the match, but none other than Asuka was able to grab the title last night. Raw Women’s Champion Ronda Rousey arrived during the match and shoved Charlotte Flair and Becky Lynch off of a ladder to the floor. This allowed “The Empress of Tomorrow” to win the first WWE main roster championship. Asuka won the Royal Rumble match during WWE’s first pay-per-view of the year, and she became the champion during the last PPV event of 2018.
This is YOUR moment!!!
Congratulations to YOUR #SDLive #WomensChampion, @WWEAsuka! #WWETLC #AndNew #TLCMatch pic.twitter.com/wP1jd7ShAf
— WWE (@WWE) December 17, 2018
#TheEmpressOfTomorrow reigns supreme. #WWETLC #AndNew pic.twitter.com/932edBl1WX
— WWE Universe (@WWEUniverse) December 17, 2018
For her, it was never about a streak or a number, it was about proving she was the best of every division she was ever a part of. Tonight, after a brutal #WWETLC match, the Empress of Tomorrow is the Champion of Today. Congratulations @WWEAsuka. #WeAreNXT pic.twitter.com/flIgmYMjEg
— Triple H (@TripleH) December 17, 2018