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SAN ANTONIO – Alexa Bliss is now feeling the heat — and, dare we say, the glow — courtesy of a breakout performance from Naomi on the Royal Rumble Kickoff.
Long pegged by the WWE Universe as a champion-in-waiting, the Total Divas star made her biggest statement yet in the Six-Woman Tag Team Match that opened the Kickoff portion. The bout, a conflagration of SmackDown LIVE’s various rivalries, started off in fairly-expected fashion with Natalya going nose-to-nose with a newly raven-haired Nikki Bella. Yet things quickly got mixed-and-matched when Becky Lynch, Nikki and Naomi joined forces for a triple suplex of Bliss, Natalya & Mickie James. Naomi then delivered the first big solo moment of the match, executing a cross body to all three of her team’s foes on the outside.
James, making her WWE pay-per-view return, helped to neutralize Lynch following Naomi’s acrobatics., She set Becky up for a Dungeon-style submission onslaught from Natalya, then booting her from behind the ref’s back when Alexa tagged in to play cleanup. Thanks to some strategy from Natalya that took Naomi and Nikki off the apron, The Irish Lass Kicker soon found herself stranded and at Bliss’ mercy … until she managed to tag in a fresh Naomi. The onetime Funkadactyl immediately took flight. With a timely assist from her teammates — a Bexploder Suplex to Mickie and a Bella spear to Natalya — she finally capped off the effort with a split-legged moonsault to Bliss, leaving her team to bask in the glow while Alexa found herself looking up at the lights.