5-5 Survivor Series Match – Winner Take All: The Rock, Undertaker, Kane, Jericho, and Chris Jericho (WWF) vs Stone Cold Steve Austin, Kurt Angle, Booker T, Rob Van Dam, and Shane McMahon.

 Team Alliance: Shane gets a good pop. Booker T gets good reaction from the Carolina fans. RVD gets a great pop. Angle gets an okay reaction, this is a couple of months after 9/11, which is probably why.  Austin’s reaction is thunderous, as always.

We get a face off between Austin and Angle.

Team WWF:  Big Show gets a good reaction and the Alliance clears out of the ring. Kane gets a good reaction. Taker’s reaction is LOUD. In 2001, he would’ve been part of WWF for eleven years and it had been ten years since he beat Hogan for the WWF Title. Taker makes sure the Alliance has sufficiently warmed up by making them jump out of the way of his ride. Jericho gets great pop. Rock gets a thunderous pop.

(I’m glad Heyman stopped doing commentary after this)

We start off with Austin vs Rock and it’s pretty much a rehash of WrestleMania X-7, just with a few more people at ringside.

For the first few minutes, the action is pretty hot and heavy, evenyone’s getting a shot at everyone else. Some of the match ups are cool (Rock/Austin, Rock/Booker, Y2J/RVD) but then some of the are odd (Angle/Kane).

Shane keeps interfering and nearly getting his ass kicked. His interference backfired on Austin while Austin was fighting Taker, which was funny.

Big Show is our first elimination, but it takes everyone on the Alliance side to accomplish it.  Shane was so caught up in his victory, he failed to notice the Rock stepping in, which lead to a candy ass getting whooped.

Alliance: 5. WWF: 4

Shane is our next elimination and Team WWF also takes turns beating him up, though Shane was done after a tombstone from Taker, who tags in Jericho, who gets the pin after a Lionsault and Taker makes sure the Alliance guys can’t interfere.

Alliance: 4. WWF: 4

Things quickly break down after this, the ring clears as both sides start duking it out, which leads to RVD getting the pin on Kane.

Alliance: 4. WWF: 3

Uh oh, it looks like Team WWF is in trouble. Taker is trying to hold down the fort while Rock and Jericho are doing…something outside. Angle gets the pin after Austin hits Taker with a stunner.

Alliance: 4. WWF: 2

(even knowing the end, the prospect of Rock and Jericho, with all their issues, being Team WWF’s last hope fills me with dread)

Booker T is eliminated next, but his loss is a little ignominious. He gets eliminated by a roll up at the hands of the Rock, who MAY have had a hold of Booker’s trunks (I couldn’t quite see).

Alliance: 3. WWF: 2

RVD is taken out by a ‘Breakdown’ (Full Nelson Facebuster) from Jericho after a very good segment between both guys.

Alliance: 2. WWF: 2

At this point, all hell breaks loose…again. The remainders of both teams start duking it out. Rock and Austin are out on the floor, Jericho and Angle are in the ring.

There’s a little miscue between Jericho and Austin because it looked like one of them missed a spot, but it gets sorted out and Jericho is being worked over by Austin and Angle.

Rock and Angle face off and Rock showing some amateur throws of his own before making Angle tap to the Sharpshooter.

Alliance: 1. WWF: 2

Rock doesn’t want to break the hold, so Austin makes him break it, but Jericho, sensing victory, and not wanting Rock to have all the glory, tags himself in, but Austin’s ready and fighting like he has everything to lose (which he does).

Jericho is eliminated after Austin counters Jericho’s roll up with one of his own and gets three. And now, we’re back where we started, Austin vs Rock.

Alliance; 1. WWF: 1

Jericho doesn’t want to leave and is keeping Hebner from doing his job. Meanwhile, Austin and Rock are beating the tar out of each other. Jericho hits Rock with the Breakdown, just for the hell of it, I guess, before leaving.

Team WWF in the locker room are furious and it looks like whatever Vince had planned may have gone up in smoke. Thankfully, Rock kicks out. Jericho can’t believe it and goes to finish the job properly, when he’s waylaid by Taker, who makes him go back to the locker room.

(Hebner should be counting, but he’s not, he keeps doing that step the refs do when they’re counting but he’s not counting.)

Rock and Austin are really tearing each other up, your really feel like both guys have everything on the line in this match.

(Okay, why couldn’t this have been the final match? Why did we have to have the 5-5?)

Austin goes for the Sharpshooter, but he doesn’t have it locked in properly.

(Rock, you’re close enough to the ropes to grab them, you can stop with the drama)

Austin decides that he’s going to end this one way or another and goes to hit Rock with the WWF title. Rock ducks, hits a spinebuster and locks in his own Sharpshooter.

Austin and Rock are to the DGAF point of this marathon, they’re using each other’s moves.

Nick Patrick runs in and pulls Hebner out of the ring and starts beating him up, for some reason. Rock is livid and tries to Rock Bottom Patrick, but Austin stops him and gives Rock a Rock Bottom, which Rock kicks out of, much to Austin and Patrick’s fury.

Austin is bleeding from either his mouth or his nose and lays out Patrick, probably realizing that this isn’t the right ref, before pulling poor Earl Hebher into the ring by the back of his shirt. Rock pushes Austin into Hebner and now it’s every man for himself.

Rock goes for the Rock Bottom, Austin counters with a stunner but there’s no ref. While Austin is trying to get Hebner to get up, Angle slides in and nails Austin with the WWF Title, giving Rock the opening for a Rock Bottom and Team WWF wins!

We see the joy of victory and the agony of defeat. Heyman is stunned silent, Stephanie is bawling, Team WWF is elated.

Vince comes to the top of the ramp and laughs a creepy looking laugh of triumph. He’s officially won the Monday Night Wars, eight months after WCW went off the air.

Results: Team WWF after Angle knocks out Austin, allowing Rock to get the pinfall.

Comments: This was a good match, but it got boring in places. It was forty-five minutes from start to finish.

Overall Comments:

 So, how was Survivor Series 2001? Overall, it was a really good show. Every match felt like the guys working really believed that everything depended on them winning, which was nice.

One thing I really appreciated was the mix of guys unifying titles. WWF unified the Intercontinental and US Titles while the Alliance unified the tag titles and kept the European Title. I liked it because it really made it feel like it was all up for grabs.

One thing I didn’t like was the final match. That match was nearly an hour long from start to finish and Austin vs Rock part 3 was the highlight. Personally, I would’ve scrapped one of the lower card matches, maybe the European Title match, Regal vs Tajiri, or the Immunity Battle Royal, and put it on Heat and had Taker, Kane, Jericho, and Show face Angle, Shane, RVD, and Booker T in a 4-4 Survivor Series match and had Rock vs Austin: Winner Take All as the main event or not bothered with a Survivor Series match and had Austin vs Rock be a Lumberjack match.

My other gripe is the swerve about who was going to turn on the Alliance. Maybe it’s because I’ve been watching WWE too long, but the emphasis on Austin being suspected of turning on the Alliance pretty much guaranteed that it wouldn’t be him. Angle being the one wasn’t really a surprise either, but after the atrocious booking of the WCW guys, Booker T and RVD were probably not considered important enough for the job. A real swerve would’ve been Shane selling out his sister and the Alliance to have the WWF all to himself when Vince and Linda retired or passed away, at least to me.

Stinkers: Regal vs Tajiri. It just never seemed to mesh as well as it should have.

Snoozers: The Main Event until the last ten minutes.

Match of the Night: Edge vs Test. That was a really great match from both guys.  Honorable mention goes to: Six Pack challenge.

Final Thoughts: I really enjoyed this show, even knowing the end. I was intrigued to see what RAW would be like, then remembered that I’d watched that RAW and knew what happened.

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