Battleground was split evenly between men’s and women’s matches, and once again, the “NXT” women’s division (with a little help from TNA) proved that it’s still the star of the show in WWE developmental. Not only were two of the men’s matches pretty clearly the worst of the evening (we’ll get to both in short order), but the NXT Women’s Championship match between Roxanne Perez and TNA Knockouts Champion Jordynne Grace was pretty clearly the best, and the other two women’s were tons of fun in radically different ways. Add to that the fact that Kelani Jordan is a more-than deserving inaugural Women’s North American Champion and Lola Vice’s star continues to rise, and the only thing preventing the women from a clean sweep at Battleground is the undeniable fact of Oba Femi’s awesomeness.

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What stood out most to me, though, is just the depth the division still has right now, even after losing Tiffany Stratton, Kiana James, and Lyra Valkyria to the main roster. There wasn’t a single woman in the North American title ladder match who felt like she didn’t belong there, and they all got the chance to shine. You’ve also got Tatum Paxley still dancing around being her insane self (possibly in TNA at some point?) and the likes of Thea Hail, Jacy Jayne, and Wren Sinclair in the reserves, while Cora Jade, Gigi Dolin, and others heal up from injuries. It’s a pretty amazing list of talent, and that’s before throwing in Grace and potentially other members of a similarly deep women’s division in TNA. Oh, and Giulia is supposedly arriving, someday.

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It’s only appropriate that the brand that started the real women’ revolution in WWE is now the stage for an extraordinarily talented group of performers who now have a singles midcard title to fight over (something that’s almost unprecedented in mainstream American wrestling) and something at least vaguely resembling equal TV and match time to the men. It’s pretty cool to see.

Now bring the NXT Women’s Tag Team Championship back, cowards.

Written by Miles Schneiderman