Kris Statlander comments on ‘very surreal’ AEW Women’s World title win
New AEW Women’s World Champion Kris Statlander doesn’t have the words to describe her title win on Saturday.
Statlander pinned Toni Storm in a fatal four-way at AEW All Out to win the title. At the post-event media scrum, she was asked what the win means to her considering she is a homegrown AEW talent.
Statlander responded:
“It’s very surreal because like you said, I’m homegrown, I’ve been here since 2019. I’ve lost opportunities at this title a good amount of times that I was like, okay, maybe I slow my roll a little bit. And now five or six years later to be finally sitting here with this (title) is like one of the most insane things ever and I don’t really have a lot of words to describe it.“
Statlander debuted for AEW in late 2019 and started getting wins on episodes of Dynamite shortly after against wrestlers such as Hikaru Shida and Britt Baker. She had her first shot at the AEW Women’s World title in January 2020 against Riho. However, she tore her left ACL in June 2020 and was out of action for 10 months. She later tore her right ACL in August 2022 and was out for a year.
Statlander was asked about being the first wrestler to have won both the TBS and AEW Women’s World titles and reflected on how injuries prevented her from doing it sooner.
“It’s been sort of a very up and down journey for me and I feel like there are so many opportunities that maybe I could have had the chance to be the first early on, but I was derailed by my knee injury.”
“So I kept (being) like maybe I’ll come back and maybe I’ll be the first person to do this. And then I get injured and then time passes by and other people step up and take that position for you.”
“It’s very much so been a little bit not hurtful, but disheartening having to be like something that was out of my control stopped me from having that historic moment. And now to finally have something to my name to be like I’m the first ever to do this, it just makes all those injuries, all the hard times, all the ups and downs so worth it. Because I worked so unbelievably hard to be in this position that I’m at today and to finally just have that title means more than I could ever imagine. Wrestling is insane.”
Statlander used a seatbelt pin to get the three-count on Storm on Saturday, a move often performed by Wheeler Yuta, who has seemingly been recruiting Statlander for the Death Riders in recent weeks. Tony Khan mentioned this to Statlander at the presser and she responded:
“Well, Tony, he’s not the only one that’s ever used the seatbelt pin. There have been some greats before him like Orange Cassidy and Chuck Taylor that have also maybe used that as a more signature thing.”
“Maybe it’s not exactly Yuta that I’m emulating,” she added.
Responding to a question from WON’s Marq Quill at the presser, Statlander said she wants to defend her title against the former champion Toni Storm first.
“Honestly, gotta give it up to the former champ, Toni Storm. She and I have still never had a singles match, and now I have two pins over her.”
Statlander’s appearance at the AEW All Out post-event presser comes in around the 9-minute mark of the video below:
Ian Carey is a writer from Toronto, Ontario, Canada, whose work has been featured in NOW Magazine, The Huffington Post, and more. A lifelong wrestling aficionado born in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, he has covered the industry for a decade and a half. He joined the f4wonline.com team in 2019.