{"id":146902,"date":"2025-11-24T22:09:59","date_gmt":"2025-11-25T03:09:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/?p=146902"},"modified":"2025-11-24T22:09:59","modified_gmt":"2025-11-25T03:09:59","slug":"last-time-is-now-semifinals-set-for-john-cena-final-match","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/2025\/11\/24\/last-time-is-now-semifinals-set-for-john-cena-final-match\/","title":{"rendered":"The Semifinals are Set for LTIN Tourney with Four Major Stars Vying for John Cena’s Final Match"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article contains match results from Monday Night Raw on 11\/24 and SmackDown on 11\/28 that relate to the Last Time is Now tournament semifinals. Due to the holiday weekend, SmackDown for 11\/28 was pre-taped. This article contains spoilers from that show. Please read at your own discretion.<\/em><\/p>\n

The Last Time is Now tournament has reached the semifinals following explosive quarterfinal matches that took place across this week’s WWE Raw and SmackDown episodes (Please note: SmackDown was pre-taped so the matches have not aired yet<\/a>). Advancing to the semifinals are four names, all deserving of the opportunity to be John Cena’s final opponent. Best yet, three of the final four are men who have never faced Cena before with the fourth being the man who once held the claim of having ‘retired’ Cena a few years ago. Let’s meet the competitors for these stacked semifinals.<\/p>\n

Last Time is Now Semifinals<\/h2>\n
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Photo Credit: WWE<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

LA Knight vs Jey Uso<\/strong><\/p>\n

Not only are these two men vying for a shot to etch their names in the history books as John Cena’s final opponent, they’ll also be re-invigorating a recent rivalry when they do so. Wisely, WWE seems to have used the Last Time is Now tournament to give fans the match they never got…at least not since the rivalry between these two intensified. Uso and Knight have met in singles action, most recently on an episode of Raw in September, but much of their recent interactions have been triple threats or fourways, with each insinuating the other was getting in their way of championship opportunities. Wrestling Cena may or may not have championship implications as well depending on what happens at Survivor Series, so there is a little added wrinkle to the equation.<\/p>\n

Interestingly enough, neither Knight or Uso has ever faced Cena in singles action. The closest either has come was when Uso and Cena were the last two standing in the 2025 Royal Rumble. Knight and Cena have only shared a ring four times. Once was when Knight wrestled the Miz and Cena was the special guest referee back in 2023, another was the Royal Rumble in 2025, and the final two saw the men on the same side, wrestling twice in tag team action, including once with Uso and Cody Rhodes and once as partners against the Bloodline’s Jimmy Uso and Solo Sikoa at Fastlane in 2023. We’ll get back to that match in a second.<\/p>\n

For Uso, he’s been in the ring with Cena 23 times, none of which were singles matches. Uso’s first match with Cena came in 2014, when he and brother Jimmy teamed with the Unseen 17 on an episode of SmackDown against the Wyatt Family. They would team together six times. The other 17 matches mostly saw the Usos on the opposite side of Cena and the Mysterios (remember when Dominik was actually a babyface?) in house show or dark matches. Since Uso has become a main event star, he and Cena have only shared a ring twice, once in the Royal Rumble and again at Money in the Bank this year when Uso teamed up with Cody Rhodes against Cena and Logan Paul.<\/p>\n

Gunther vs Solo Sikoa<\/strong><\/p>\n

When word started to spread about who John Cena’s final opponent would be, there were several names (including wrestlers who work for other companies) that stood out. Of those names though, one soon rose to the top and it was Gunther. There are mixed reactions to Gunther being the one to retire Cena (you can read one such opinion on that here<\/a>). The rumors haven’t been officially confirmed but as the Last Time is Now tournament continues, all roads are pointing toward that outcome save for a massive twist at this point.<\/p>\n

That doesn’t mean Gunther will have an easy road however. He’s up against Solo Sikoa, who is the only wrestler of the remaining four to have wrestled Cena in a singles match. And Sikoa did it in a big way. As the Bloodline’s enforcer, Sikoa drew the task of facing Cena at Crown Jewel in 2023. He defeated the current IC champ and in doing so, proclaimed to have retired the legend. It was a bit premature but Sikoa likely wants nothing more than to lay the final nail in Cena’s coffin at Saturday Night’s Main Event.<\/p>\n

Gunther’s story to defeating Cena would be a little different. A search of John Cena on Gunther’s Cagematch page brings up the following result: No items were found that match the search parameters. No house shows, no live events, no dark matches. No multi-man matches. Not even a Royal Rumble. Much like Penta, Gunther and Cena have never shared a ring and that’s what makes their potential showdown all the more compelling. Add to it the factor of the Intercontinental Championship, should Cena retain at Survivor Series, and you have a story of one man reclaiming the title, for which he holds the record as the longest-reigning champ (666 days), from the man who used up almost all of his career matches to finally win said belt. Gunther becoming the Intercontinental Champion again by defeating Cena feels right and feels like the perfect way to start another new lengthy reign for the Ring General.<\/p>\n

More From LWOS Pro Wrestling<\/b><\/strong><\/p>\n

Header photo \u2013 WWE \u2013 Stay tuned to the\u00a0<\/i><\/em>Last Word on Pro Wrestling<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a> for more on John Cena final match, the Last Time is Now tournament, 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.<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n

You can check out WWE programming on\u00a0<\/i><\/em>Netflix<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0(Raw),\u00a0<\/i><\/em>USA Network<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0(SmackDown),\u00a0<\/i><\/em>The CW<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0(NXT),\u00a0<\/i><\/em>Tubi<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0(WWE Evolve),\u00a0<\/i><\/em>A&E<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>\u00a0(WWE Superstar Sunday \u2013 Rivals, WWE LFG, and Greatest Moments) and\u00a0<\/i><\/em>Peacock<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/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<\/i><\/em>YouTube<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>, and catch fast-paced action on X (<\/i><\/em>WWE Speed<\/i><\/u><\/em><\/a>).<\/i><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This article contains match results from Monday Night Raw on 11\/24 and SmackDown on 11\/28 that relate to the Last Time is Now tournament semifinals. Due to the holiday weekend, SmackDown for 11\/28 was pre-taped. This article contains spoilers from that show. Please read at your own discretion. The Last Time is Now tournament has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2418,"featured_media":145803,"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":[2,12,2192,25,26,4,3],"tags":[8238,1724,9001,7482,8343],"class_list":["post-146902","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-news","category-wrestling","category-raw","category-smackdown","category-wwe","category-wwe-universe","tag-gunther","tag-jey-uso","tag-john-cena-retirement","tag-la-knight","tag-solo-sikoa"],"modified_by":"Marilee Gallagher, Manager","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146902","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=146902"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146902\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":146987,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/146902\/revisions\/146987"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145803"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=146902"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=146902"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/prowrestling\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=146902"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}