Ice Ribbon New Ice Ribbon #874 Results & Review (3/25/2018)

Welcome to some more coverage and today, we introduce another Joshi promotion into the mix called Ice Ribbon. Ice Ribbon is something I’m fairly new to also, but I do know quite a few of them from other places and I was honestly impressed with what I’ve seen. I kinda thought they would get a streaming deal, but they unfortunately don’t have one yet.

For those that don’t know for some history, Ice Ribbon was formed in 2006 by Joshi Wrestler, Emi Sakura and had been with the company for six years before her departure in 2012 due to personal reasons. I don’t know who is the promoter right now, but they’re still growing as this was their 874th show and probably more since some had different names, so pretty good for twelve years and let’s see what they give us here and…dive right in.

Singles Match
Asahi vs. Karen DATE

Review: One complaint I do have is that our two female commentators are always on the bottom right corner of the screen and you see them talking while the match i going on and sometimes it can get pretty distracting and I can see why it would turn people off.

Karen DATE was another one who is 14 years old and I thought it was Stardom that started them young and it looks like that’s the case here also. More info on the DATE’s is that all four of them are actually mixed martial artists that got signed last March and seem to have been doing well for themselves. The match was standard even with Asahi messing up what looked like to be a Code Red spot near the end, but she was able to correct it pretty quickly and did did fairly well. Karen would get the win with her Yoga Flamingo Lock to make Asahi tap out.

Recommended: Match was decent and harmless, so up to you.

Tag Team Match
Giulia & Nao DATE vs. Hana DATE & Mai Mizuochi

Review: Two more of the DATE’s are in and on separate sides of the ring fighting each other in tag team competition, so let’s see what Nao and Hana can do after Karen being impressive. This match felt like it would be a little all over the place at times and a couple of noticeable botches here and there. Mai I felt like didn’t do too much in the match except for the beginning as Hana looked like she did most of the work. Nao and Giulia did fairly okay as well, but I was more impressed with Hana out of the four here. Hana would apply the Cross Armbar on Giulia to secure the win for her and Mai.

Recommended: This was just okay, so up to you again if you wanna watch and if you do, keep an eye on Hana DATE.

Tag Team Match
Akane Fujita & Minoru Fujita vs. Mochi Miyagi & Mr. Gannosuke

Review: It appears we have a mix tag match here and not only that, it is also a Hardcore Match. Of course as how most of these typically go, it starts with an all out brawl to the outside and leads all around the arena as they mostly focused on Minoru and Gannosuke while you hardly see what Akane and Mochi did during that time.

There was a spot where Akane would attempt to hit Gannosuke with the bat, but ducks and hits her partner by accident, and they would do it again but with Minoru trying to hit him this time and then also hits his partner by accident. I couldn’t tell what Akane was throwing at Gannosuke or at the crowd, but it appeared to be lemons? She even put one in Gannosuke’s mouth, so I can only assume it was lemons. Lemons as a weapon? Deadly. The Fujita siblings would have Mochi against the ladder and would rush her with a piggy back ride only for Mochi to push the ladder towards them which completely miss and Akane for some reason falls down…well okay then. First we get the lemons and now we get the ring covered in one of the most deadliest weapons known to man…legos. Being slammed into those can hurt and they made sure they were used, specially by Mr. Gannosuke as he slammed both Fujita’s onto quite a few times. Five minutes after all of that, Mr. Gannosuke picked up the win by hitting Akane Fujita with the Nenbutsu Powerbomb onto a pile of chairs and legos! The teams would shake hands after the match to show respect to one another in a class act.

Recommended: Aside from a couple of sloppy spots, this was actually pretty entertaining and worth a view.

Six Man Tag Team Match
Maika Ozaki, Saori Anou & Tae Honma vs. Matsuya Uno, Satsuki Totoro & Tequila Saya

Review: From what I can gather from this match is that this is apparently a first round match of a tournament in which I can assume is them creating a Trios Championship of sorts. Guess it’s a good time to do it due to how popular it’s been getting recently, so may as well strike while it’s still hot. This review will be a bit short due to not fully knowing everyone on the roster still and don’t wanna get confused as to who is who with six people in the ring, but that’ll change if I continue to follow I’m sure. The match was fun and Maika Ozaki would get the win for her team after hitting a stiff Lariat and a Diving Senton onto Tequila Saya.

Recommended: Better than the previous tag match earlier in the show and again not bad at all.

Triangle Ribbon Title #1 Contendership Match
Kyuri vs. Maruko Nagasaki vs. Tsukushi

Review: As the title says above as this is a three way match determine who will be the number one contender or at least one of them to fight against the Triangle Ribbon Champion, Hideki Suzuki. Never really seen a championship based off of just three way matches and I’m surprised Stardom hasn’t decided to do this yet, but I’m interested. All three of these women right here were incredibly agile in the ring and with how they performed most of their moves. Kyuri had some nice bridges applied during her moves and pinfalls and think she would be great for a Dragon Suplex if she ever decide to do one. The match was about five minutes long and Tsukushi picked up the win with the Harukaze on Kyuri, making her one of the contenders for the Triangle Ribbon Championship.

Recommended: For the time we had, it was fun and entertaining, all three impressed me tonight.

International Ribbon Tag Team Title Match
Maya Yukihi & Risa Sera (c) vs. Hamuko Hoshi & Tsukasa Fujimoto

Review: We get our first title match of the night and it’s nice to see someone I am familiar with, Tsukasa Fujimoto who is definitely one of their best on the roster and someone you should check out. Maya and Risa also have a name for their tag team which is called Azure Revolution and yes, they wear blue for their outfits and this is their second title defense for this reign as they hope to retain. I think this might be one of my favorite Joshi tag team matches so far this year, both teams worked fantastic together and had great chemistry in the ring which equals a quality type of match in my opinion.

Tsukasa showed why she’s one of my top Joshi wrestlers in this sport with how well she performs in the ring, how she moves, and shows why she’s been a five time ICExInfinity Champion. Maya and Risa are also a great team and I can see why they’re our current champions right now while Hamuko also does her part well and was entertaining to watch. Azure Revolution would pick up the win to retain their titles as Maya Yukihi would hit the Swanton Bomb on Hamuko to pick up the win.

Recommended: Great tag team match, worth a viewing.

ICExInfinity Title Match
Hiragi Kurumi (c) vs. Miyako Matsumoto

Review: A little bit of info on both of these two before we begin the match here, Hiragi Kurumi has been with the company for eight years and has been wrestling since she was ten years old and no, I am not kidding as she’s only eighteen years old right now and even won the ICExInfinity title the first time when she was fifteen years old too, so she’s probably done more than most of us that are reading this at this age. This is her second reign with the title and her second title defense as she looks to take on the crowd favorite of Ice Ribbon, Miyako Matsumoto. Miyako is another person I’m familiar with and the first person that I’ve actually watch when I was watching matches here and there, even made it on my list for top matches last year. Miyako is thirty-three years old with almost ten years of experience in her name and has won the title once eight years ago and only held it for 13 days. She has also won all the currently active championships in the company, but her last title run was with the Triangle Ribbon Championship five years ago and she’s looking to win another title as the underdog in this match.

Hiragi while she’s eighteen, she looks like she could maul you at any second if given the chance to here and that’s exactly what she does to Miyako throughout the match here as she makes sure Miyako experiences every bit of pain she does to her in and out of the ring. Miyako would do a small dive off the balcony onto Hiragi and some of the roster to try and slow her down a little bit to get some momentum, but still not enough as Hiragi still destroys her for most of the match and the crowd starts getting behind out underdog here. I am loving how the story of the match flows for Miyako and you can tell how much everyone cares about her as the match progresses. Hiragi would start to pull the heavy arsenals on her to try and put Hiragi and it’s STILL not enough to put her away, she’s got heart let me tell you. Close to the twenty minute mark the impossible has happened, Miyako would roll her up with the Gannosuke Clutch to pick up the win and become the NEW ICExInfinity Champion that she hasn’t won in eight years!

The crowd is excited to see this finally happen again and I am right there with them, very well earned and after the match, she would thank the audience tonight before she got cut off by Karen DATE who challenges her on the April 8th show at KFC Hall.

Recommended: The match itself was solid, but the story is what sold it for me. Worth a view.

Overall: For seeing my first Ice Ribbon show from beginning to end, I thought it was fun. Yeah the commentary team annoyed me a bit, but I’ve gotten used to it a little bit and focused more on the wrestling as the last two matches delivered to make me wanna keep watching them.

Favorite Match: Maya Yukihi & Risa Sera vs. Hamuko Hoshi & Tsukasa Fujimoto

Least Favorite Match: Giulia & Nao DATE vs. Hana DATE & Mai Mizuochi

Score: 7.5/10

Hope to see you all for the next one.