This past Wednesday night on DYNAMITE: MAXIMUM CARNAGE both Harley Cameron and Julia Hart participated in the Casino Gauntlet for a shot at the AEW Women’s World Championship come GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA. The outcome of the bout went in Toni Storm’s favor, but there’s no doubt that the interaction between Julia, Harley, and Jamie Hayter played a role in that result. Though Harley avoided a Haterade from the former Women’s Champion, she ended up with a face full of black mist from Hart. Julia kicked Hayter right in the head to knock her out of the equation, but the time Hart took to try and apply her Hartless submission left her vulnerable to a small package pin from Toni.
Each blames the other for neither securing the championship opportunity, so tonight on COLLISION: MAXIMUM CARNAGE Julia Hart and Harley Cameron will go one-on-one for the first time to settle their score!
CASINO GAUNTLET MATCH: Kris Statlander vs. ????
The breakdown of the Casino Gauntlet is well known by this point; as Renee Paquette’s voice-over on the above embedded video stated two will start, there is no set time limit, no set number of entrants, and no set interval upon which the entrants will arrive. Beyond #1 and #2, there is no guarantee anyone else will see action during the Casino Gauntlet because the end can come at any time via pinfall or submission.
The first time out eight men made it into the fray before Will Ospreay scored the decision at 18:43 while in the second outing nine competitors got to the ring before Ospreay won again, this time after 22:14. When Christian Cage scored his victory at ALL IN: LONDON 2024, 12 made their entry in the 25:57 duration of the bout while in the Tag Team variation nine teams participated before Ospreay and Kyle Fletcher claimed victory in 22:16. Just last week, in the Casino Gauntlet that earned Powerhouse Hobbs his shot tonight against Jon Moxley, 11 men made it into the competition before Hobbs topped Kyle O’Reilly in 26:33, making that the longest Gauntlet to date. This AEW original match is the epitome of unpredictability, and that will no doubt continue tonight when the Women’s Division runs the gauntlet for the very first time!
We know that former TBS Champion Kris Statlander will take the #1 position by virtue of her victory over Willow Nightingale and Toni Storm last Wednesday night, but beyond that the field is quite the mystery! We don’t know who else will step into the fray to earn an AEW Women’s World Title match at GRAND SLAM: AUSTRALIA, but the locker room is laden with competitors capable of earning that opportunity! We’ve got former AEW World Champions such as Jamie Hayter, Thunder Rosa, and Nyla Rose, former TBS Champions like Willow Nightingale and Julia Hart, women such as Serena Deeb, Deonna Purrazzo, and Taya Valkyrie who’ve held gold many times over in their careers outside AEW, and of course AEW has been home to many competitors from Japan like Emi Sakura, Yuka Sakazaki, and Mina Shirakawa.
There are so many potential entrants into this field, all who’d love nothing more than to make history at AEW’s first-ever event in Australia, but who will run the Gauntlet and get their shot on February 15th? AEW Women’s World Champion Mariah May plans to be right there at the commentary table watching it all unfold…