Hours after winning the AEW Women’s World Championship, Willow Nightingale finally explained the injury that nearly derailed her whole year.
Speaking in the AEW Redemption post-show media scrum, the new champion detailed the injury that had sidelined her since May and forced her to vacate the TBS Championship and withdraw from the Owen Hart Cup. She revealed she suffered an AC sprain in her right shoulder during a TBS Title defense against Red Velvet.
For transparency’s sake, I had an AC sprain, which is something that I have experienced in my other shoulder a few times, and it wasn’t as bad. So, in my head, I think that’s also why I was like, ‘I’ll be good for Double or Nothing!'
The reality turned out to be far more serious than she first assumed, and she pointed to a friend’s experience as a warning of how bad an AC injury can get.
One of my good friends who works here had an AC injury and they had to get surgery and were out for like months and months and months. So, it is, depending on the grade or the severity of it, something that could be, ‘Alright, you’re out for a few weeks’ or, ‘You’re out for almost a whole year.'
Nightingale said the injury was severe enough that simply getting home became an ordeal.
I had to drive home after I hurt it. That was terrible. I was like, ‘I’m convinced I can drive back from Maryland to New York,’ which is like a five-hour drive. I’m like, ‘I can do that.’ I got like 30 minutes in and I was like, ‘I have to get a hotel right now. This is impossible.'
Giving up the TBS Title, she explained, came down to principle.
If I’m TBS Champ, I wanna be defending this whenever an opportunity comes up, whenever there’s a challenger. I was like, ‘If I can’t do that, I shouldn’t be champion.'
Fortunately, her injury didn’t require the surgery her friend needed, and the recovery went well enough to get her back for a run at the biggest prize. Nightingale defeated Thekla at the Bell Centre in Montreal to become Women’s World Champion, and she’ll defend the title against Mercedes Moné at All In: London on August 30.
