Newly crowned TBS Champion Willow Nightingale reflected on the past four years after her win at AEW Dynasty.
At the post-show press conference, she recalled how far she had come since the pandemic era. She said:
For me, even getting to AEW in the first place, I had to put work in like every day, every moment. Because I really started here.
I was coming down to Jacksonville during the pandemic and I was sitting front row in the crowd and cheering for everyone.
And I was in the dark matches and trying my best to put my best foot forward and be the best Willow I could be and make an impression.
And while I did feel like there were people who were paying attention, it was like, “How do I make this happen? I want this to be my job. I want to work here. I love AEW.”
Nightingale added:
I was sitting down during quarantine at home every Wednesday watching in my Philly apartment with my boyfriend. I was like, “I know this is where I wanna be.”
For me, it felt like a very long journey, but I think it really started last year in May, when I first wrestled Mercedes in the Owen Hart tournament that I won.
And even having the first women’s main event in Ring of Honor history against Athena, like bang, bang, bang, back to back — that felt like a new level for me entirely that I was reaching.
And so at that point, that’s when it was clear to me, it was like, “Okay, I can be this performer. I can be this high-level competitor.”
And now we’re here, and you always think about like getting to the finish line, but this isn’t the finish line. It’s like, now I’m kind of just starting.
She also voiced the desire to make the TBS Championship a stage for international talent:
I guess I take pride in like being someone who’s gone overseas, gone to work with our partners at New Japan and CMLL and I’ve wrestled in Japan and in Mexico, being the first woman in our division to go representing AEW specifically.
And personally, I hope that I would have opportunities to bring in people from different countries. You know, I think we have an amazing roster. I wanna face as many of the girls that we got here as possible, but also if we could get any of those STARDOM and CMLL wrestlers in, if that could be possible, I would love that.
