Last night's episode of NXT proved to be must-watch television with a shock debut that's seen yet another AEW star make the leap to WWE.
During the show's closing moments, NXT Champion Trick Williams and Je'Von Evans, with rapper Sexyy Red at ringside, defeated Gallus. That brought out Lash Legend who asked Williams whether he was behind the attack on the Meta-Four's Oro Mensah and Noam Dar backstage.
However, before Williams could answer, the WWE Performance Center's lights went out.
"All Ego" Ethan Page then hit the ring and took down Williams and Evans in front of a shocked crowd. He took credit for attacking Mensah and Dar, and proceeded to "whoop that Trick" before holding up the NXT Championship as the episode ended.
Another AEW star who Tony Khan seemingly forgot about, we've known since the start of this month that Page was planning to leave the company. Tellingly, he's friends with Cody Rhodes and was brought into the promotion by him in March 2021.
Elsewhere in the show, NXT General Manager Ava let NXT Women's Champion Roxanne Perez know that her new challenger has been found for NXT Battleground: current TNA Knockouts Champion Jordynne Grace!
"Roxanne, you are a great champion, a two-time champion," Grace told Perez. "You have built your name here at NXT, the same as I have in TNA. But I'm curious, who do you think has built the stronger foundation? I want to find out. So at Battleground, I'm going to be challenging you for your NXT Women's Championship. And I'm fully prepared to leave Las Vegas a double champion."
There's been chatter about WWE creating a working relationship with TNA and this is yet another indication of that (there's already speculation about AJ Styles making a surprise/brief TNA return after his recent misfortunes in WWE).
NXT has come a long way since becoming NXT 2.0 on Vince McMahon's watch and it's hard not to wonder how this version of the show would have fared when it was going head-to-head with AEW Dynamite.
Check out some highlights from NXT below.