{"id":134276,"date":"2025-04-21T21:18:32","date_gmt":"2025-04-22T01:18:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=134276"},"modified":"2025-04-22T00:36:38","modified_gmt":"2025-04-22T04:36:38","slug":"rusev-returns-and-lays-waste-to-the-alpha-academy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/04\/21\/rusev-returns-and-lays-waste-to-the-alpha-academy\/","title":{"rendered":"Rusev Returns and Lays Waste to the Alpha Academy"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Closing out the first hour of the Raw after Mania was a return many had expected. Though perhaps not in the way they expected as Rusev returned to WWE&#8230;in the middle of a New Day and Alpha Academy altercation.<\/p>\n<p>New Day entered the ring with their usual schtick telling the fans they needed to thank God for the New Day, the greatest tag team in WWE past or present. In fact, New Day said there was no team alive or dead who could step with them in the ring. Sure enough, a team from the back took issue with that but likely not one anybody expected. Alpha Academy came out as Maxxine Dupri reminded Xavier Woods and Kofi Kingston that the last time they wrestled Otis and Akira Tozawa, that New Day lost in just 60 seconds. She thought that her boys deserved a shot at the titles tonight to which New Day said no. But Dupri coaxed them into it calling them the &#8216;Minute Men&#8217; which fired up Kingston who agreed to the title match.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Rusev returns to destroy Alpha Academy: Raw highlights, April 21, 2025\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/K1SRfYFgzbE?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Before the bell could ring however, the lights went dark and all eyes turned to the entrance ramp as Rusev made his grand entrance. As the crowd chanted &#8216;Rusev Day,&#8217; the Bulgarian Brute made his way down the ramp and entered the ring, clearing the New Day out quickly. Otis and Tozawa tried to stand strong but they were no match for Rusev&#8217;s power as he took both men down before locking on the Accolade.<\/p>\n<p>It&#8217;s unclear why WWE had Rusev return in the middle of the tag title scene but all that matters is the man is back and he&#8217;s got unfinished business to attend to.<\/p>\n<p><strong>More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em><span data-preserver-spaces=\"true\">Header photo \u2013 WWE \u2013<\/span><\/em>\u00a0<em>Stay tuned to the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_self\">Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/a> for more on WWE Raw tonight, Raw after Mania, Rusev, and other stories from around the world of wrestling, as they develop. You can always count on LWOPW to be on top of the major news in the wrestling world, as well as to provide you with analysis, previews, videos, interviews, and editorials on the wrestling world.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em>You can check out WWE programming on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.netflix.com\/title\/81788927\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Netflix<\/a>\u00a0(Raw),\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.usanetwork.com\/wwe-friday-night-smackdown\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">USA Network<\/a>\u00a0(SmackDown),\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cwtv.com\/shows\/wwe-nxt\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The CW<\/a>\u00a0(NXT),\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/tubitv.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Tubi<\/a>\u00a0(WWE Evolve),\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.aetv.com\/wwe\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">A&amp;E<\/a>\u00a0(WWE Superstar Sunday \u2013 Rivals, WWE LFG, and Greatest Moments) and\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.peacocktv.com\/watch\/home\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Peacock<\/a>\u00a0(WWE Main Event as well as archives and premium live event streaming). Follow WWE on social media to relive top moments and matches on\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/wwe\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">YouTube<\/a>, and catch fast-paced action on X (<a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/i\/events\/1773457579022155776?lang=en\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">WWE Speed<\/a>).<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Closing out the first hour of the Raw after Mania was a return many had expected. Though perhaps not in the way they expected as Rusev returned to WWE&#8230;in the middle of a New Day and Alpha Academy altercation. New Day entered the ring with their usual schtick telling the fans they needed to thank [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2418,"featured_media":134277,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"no","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,12,2192,25,4,3],"tags":[2512,202,2352],"class_list":["post-134276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-news","category-wrestling","category-raw","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","tag-raw-after-mania","tag-rusev","tag-rusev-day"],"modified_by":"Marilee Gallagher, Manager","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2418"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=134276"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134276\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":134294,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/134276\/revisions\/134294"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/134277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=134276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=134276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=134276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}