Johnny Gargano and Tommaso Ciampa were riding high as they headed into Saturday night’s NXT TakeOver: San Antonio on Saturday. The NXT Tag Team Champions had just won the fan voting award for NXT Match Of The Year, and the San Antonio crowd was hot for team hashtag Do It Both Of You Dudes. But they had never faced a team quite like Akam and Rezar, the Authors of Pain.
The Authors of Pain rolled into TakeOver with all the momentum, as they won the finals of the Dusty Rhodes Tag Team Classic Tournament at NXT TakeOver: Toronto and have spent all of their time since then laying waste to every team that’s been put in front of them.
Gargano and Ciampa put forward a valiant effort, as they always do, but they were overmatched and overpowered from the outside. Although #DIY managed to catch some lucky breaks, eventually they were unable to overcome the sheer might and brutality of the Authors, and succumbed to the Super Collider and then the Authors’ The Last Chapter double-team finisher, with Ciampa taking the pinfall.
All told, #DIY held the tag team titles for just 69 days … only one day more than the last beloved babyface team to hold the titles, American Alpha.
