There has always been constant movement in NXT. Every couple of months, a fresh new wave of talent is ready to make its mark. When that happens, many times a division gets strengthened. The men’s division may get stronger during call-up season. Other times, it’s the women’s division that gets new stars.
For the past couple of weeks, some call-ups and returns have strengthened the men’s tag team division in a major way. There have been many brawls between several teams looking to get their hands on each other.
The current NXT Tag Team Champions, DarkState, haven’t really been involved. However, there had to be a prize if the teams fought each other. On the February 17, 2026 episode of NXT, a fatal four-way match was held to determine the number one contender for the NXT Tag Team Championships.
The Vanity Project Gets a Tag Team Championship Match with DarkState
The men’s tag team division in NXT is extremely strong, which is probably why they don’t like each other. Hank & Tank are former tag team champions. Niko Vance & Shawn Spears have been waiting for title opportunities. OTM (Bronco Nima and Lucien Price) have returned after months away.
The Vanity Project (Brad Baylor and Ricky Smokes), along with Jackson Drake, is now on NXT full-time. They each want an opportunity to challenge DarkState and potentially become the new NXT Tag Team Champions. In order to do that, they had to battle each other for that opportunity. The match began, and everyone started brawling.
The chaotic action and energy that was around them for the past several weeks never left them at all. Spears and Vance were beating up Tank outside the ring when Hank leapt onto them to defend his tag partner. Vanity Project and OTM were brawling until OTM dropped Baylor and Smokes on the ground. Even when two men were in the ring, the others were outside fighting each other. The level of chaos equaled Friday’s ten-man match with MFT.
When Vance had Nima beat, Hank & Tank barreled into Vance, allowing Nima to escape. At one point, the ref had lost complete control of the match. There was no way of knowing who was the legal man. Things finally calmed down when Hank & Tank speared OTM through the announcer’s table. Simultaneously, Vance attacked Drake, allowing Smokes to push Baylor onto Spears.
With no one to interfere, he got the pinfall and the victory. DarkState now has contenders for their NXT Tag Team Championships. The Vanity Project survived an epic match, and now they have a chance to get their first titles in NXT.
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