-Video package of Tommaso Ciampa winning the ROH World TV Championship, Matt Taven trying to turn over a new leaf, and Jay Lethal moving back into the title picture.
-Matt Taven comes down to the ring for our ROH TV main event, with the Hoopla Hotties following him. Truth Martini comes down to the ring in street clothes, and he doesn't look happy. He says he hasn't talked to anybody from Ring of Honor since Final Battle. Truth says Taven used to like to party, he used to like the hoopla, but since he lost the title he's killed their lifestyle. He announces that Hoopla is dead, and sends the girls to the back. Matt Taven grabs the mic from him and thanks Truth for guiding him to the TV title, but says he's outgrown them, and dismisses Martini to the back.
3-Way ROH TV Championship Match
Matt Taven vs. Jay Lethal vs. Tommaso Ciampa (c)
Ciampa hits the ring and starts attacking everyone, streamers still in the ring and wrapped around everyone. The referee clears the ring of all the streams as Lethal dropkicks Taven off the apron. Lethal with a head of steam and hits the suicide dive not once, not twice, but five times on both Ciampa and Taven. Steve Corino belts out an excited "soaring and scoring!" as they fade to a commercial break. When ROH comes back, Ciampa is taking apart some of the padding on the outside. The champ picks up Lethal and slams him through one of the barricade pannels, before suplexing Taven on the concrete. "This is awesome!" chant from the fans. Truth Martini comes back out and joins commentary, complaining about Matt Taven firing him. Ciampa drills Lethal with a series of hard knees into the corner, but Taven hits the ring and plants the champ with a delayed vertical suplex. A Lionsault attempt misses, but Tommaso misses Project Ciampa as well. Taven with Angel's Wings for a two-count. Ciampa goes for his finisher again on Lethal, but Taven hits a bicylcle kick on both guys; everyone is down. After a few moments all three guys start trading knife-edge chops. The Lethal Combination connects on Ciampa, and Jay trasitions nicely into the Koji Clutch. He breaks the hold, hits the Lethal Injection, tries for a pin attempt, but Matt Taven blocks the pin with a top rope frog splash out of nowhere! Truth Martini slides the "Book of Truth" into the ring, but Taven throws it back at him. They get in each other's face and Lethal dropkicks them both to the outside. Lethal with a small package pin but the referee is distracted. Ciampa with a knock-out knee, but Taven comes back and tosses Lethal out of the ring. Martini trips up Taven, the champion hits Project Ciampa and picks up the 1-2-3 to retain.
Mike's Thoughts: Another awesome match that brings the total to 3/3 tonight. I love the progression between Truth Martini and Matt Taven. You would assume Truth will find a replacement for the House of Truth, and that we'll get a match in the near future, taking Taven out of the title hunt. There's a staredown between Lethal and Ciampa after the match, so things are likely not finished between them. Ciampa moves on, for the time being, to the Top Prospects winner Hanson at the 12th Anniversary show.
I have a few issues with Ring of Honor TV – Adam Cole hasn't been properly utilized at all in 2014, I want an update on Kevin Steen and Cliff Compton – but this week's episode made me forget about them. Three great matches, the worst of which beat out any other company's best efforts this week. Now that the Top Prospects tournament is over we'll probably see more from the other angles going on in the background (more Steen please), but this had to have ben the best episode of ROH TV so far this year.
Hanson is your new Top Prospects winner. Past winners include Mike Bennett and Matt Taven, with past participants including Kyle O'Reilly, Adam Cole, Michael Elgin, Silas Young, Q.T. Marshall and a few other notable entries. All that to say this: we probably haven't seen the last of Raymond Rowe, who I still believe was the stand-out star of this tournament.
The Decade pick up another big win over Adrenaline RUSH this week. I would like to see a bit more storyline progression from them. Their faction is hot. As I've been saying, there's some money in a Decade vs. Kevin Steen, AJ Styles and Chris Hero match during WrestleMania weekend. You can replace Steen with another guy that went away and came back, but the story pretty much writes itself with the other two.
Three fantastic matches, some decent progresssion in the TV title divison, the tournament finals and a great tag team opener make this the best episode of Ring of Honor TV all year.
