Legends collide as Copeland meets Suzuki on Dynamite on TSN2
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In a first-time meeting, Adam Copeland goes one-on-one with Minoru Suzuki. Plus, "Hangman" Adam Page takes on Penta El Zero Miedo and Swerve Strickland squares off with Jeff Hardy. You can catch AEW Dynamite LIVE at 8pm et/5pm pt on TSN2, streaming on the TSN App and on TSN.ca.
"The Rated R Superstar" Adam Copeland vs. Minoru Suzuki - Very few have ever contemplated what it would be like to see Adam Copeland take on Minoru Suzuki, but on Wednesday night that dream match is set to go down on Dynamite. Between Copeland and the man who trained under Karl Gotch, the duo has held 45 major titles over their illustrious careers. With Copeland spending the past two decades in WWE and Suzuki almost exclusively competing in Japan, a matchup between the two seemed impossible until now. We last saw Suzuki compete in an AEW ring this past fall when he unsuccessfully vied for Eddie Kingston's ROH World Championship and New Japan Strong Openweight Championships ahead of the Oct. 10 Dynamite. In fact, Suzuki is looking for his first victory in an AEW ring since Forbidden Door 2022 when he teamed with Chris Jericho and Sammy Guevara to defeat Kingston, Shota Umino and Wheeler YUTA. The match comes as Copeland continues on his quest to once again unseat Christian Cage as the TNT Championship. Since winning and then losing the title at the World's End pay-per-view on Dec. 30, Copeland is undefeated, having won three straight singles matches and four in total. He last competed on Saturday night's Collision, earning a victory over Top Flight's Dante Martin. Will his march back towards his former partner continue or will Suzuki stop him in his tracks?
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"Hangman" Adam Page vs. Penta El Zero Miedo (w/ Alex Abrahantes) - Adam Page's focus is on once again becoming AEW World Champion. Over the past several weeks, Page has conceded that he took his eyes off the prize in 2023 and that's about to change. He made that very clear to both current AEW World Champion Samoa Joe and his archrival Swerve Strickland, who is also coming for Joe. On last week's Dynamite, Joe turned away a spirited challenge from FTW Champion Hook, finally putting him down with the Coquina Clutch. After the match, Joe wasn't satisfied with only beating Hook, he wanted to hurt him. His post-match attack was foiled by the arrival of Page, who intends to make Joe uncomfortable at every turn. Before he can continue to do that, though, he faces a stiff test of his own on Wednesday night in the form of Penta El Zero Miedo. Like Page, Penta is a former AEW World Tag Team Champion and while much of his tenure in AEW has been in the tag-team division as one half of the Lucha Bros. with brother Rey Fenix and in the trios division as part of Death Triangle with Fenix and "The Bastard" PAC, Penta is a more-than-accomplished singles competitor in his own right. Penta is a former Impact/TNA World Champion and has held the AAA Latin American Championship, a title also held by the likes of L.A. Park, Psycho Clown and El Hijo del Fantasma. He is more than capable of holding his own against the Hangman. The match on Wednesday night will be the first singles match between the two with Page and Penta having split a pair of tag-team matches in the past (Lucha Bros. versus Page and Kenny Omega). Page heads into the match as a winner of three straight. Can he keep rolling or will Penta slow his roll?
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Swerve Strickland (w/ Prince Nana) vs. Jeff Hardy (w/ Matt Hardy) - Frustration is clearly mounting for the Hardys. Just before a loss to now ROH World Tag Team Champions Mike Bennett and Matt Taven at the end of December, Matt Hardy said that the rest of the AEW tag-team division might be overlooking the Hardys as the legends that they are. On this past Friday night's Rampage, Jeff Hardy fell to Darby Allin in a wild spectacle of a match that greatly resembled the first contest between the two in 2022. After the match, Allin offered a fist bump of respect to Hardy, but he blew him off and left the ring. Recent results are obviously getting to the brothers and things won't get any easier on Wednesday night when Jeff takes on perhaps the hottest competitor in all of AEW in Swerve Strickland. After a fine showing in the Continental Classic and two statement victories over "Hangman" Adam Page, Strickland has made no secret that he's gunning for Samoa Joe's AEW World Championship, telling "The Samoan Submission Machine" to his face. Another win, this one over a six-time world champion, would help Swerve continue his march towards a title shot, while a win for Hardy would help get the brothers back on track and prove that both are still capable of competing at a high level. Which of these two men will pick up a win in a high-stakes encounter?
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AEW World Trios Championship match: The Acclaimed ("Platinum" Max Caster and "The Five-Tool Player" Anthony Bowens) and "Daddy Ass" Billy Gunn (c) (w/ "Switchblade" Jay White, Austin Gunn and Colten Gunn) vs. The Mogul Embassy ("The Machine" Brian Cage, Toa Liona and Bishop Kaun) (w/ Prince Nana) - A sizemic shift occurred in the AEW/ROH trios division over the past week. On last Wednesday's Dynamite, Bullet Club Gold (Jay White, Austin Gunn and Colten Gunn) captured the ROH World Six-Man Tag Team Championships from the Mogul Embassy (Brian Cage, Toa Liona and Bishop Kaun). Then on Collision, Bullet Club Gold aligned with Max Caster, Anthony Bowens and the Gunns' father, Billy Gunn, to form "The Bang Bang Scissor Gang," a new super faction built to do battle with the Undisputed Kingdom (Adam Cole, Roderick Strong, Wardlow, Mike Bennett and Matt Taven). The move immediately raised eyebrows largely due to the long-standing enmity between The Acclaimed and the Gunns. The first test of this alliance comes on Wednesday night when Caster, Bowens and Gunn put their AEW World Trios Championships on the line against Cage, Liona and Kaun, who are looking to grab new trios gold only a week after losing theirs. What role will White and the Gunns play here after it was Bowens who helped the trio foil Prince Nana's interference and aid Bullet Club Gold in capturing the ROH titles last week? The Mogul Embassy will undoubtedly be out for payback, but will that desire prevent them from focusing on the task at hand? Which of these trios walks out of Dynamite as champions?
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PLUS:
- Wardlow takes on Trent Beretta
- Thunder Rosa does battle with Red Velvet
- AEW Women's World Champion "Timeless" Toni Storm goes face to face with "The Virtuosa" Deonna Purrazzo