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LA Knight Wins WWE United States Championship On Smackdown

Originally posted on Wrestling on SI | By Zack Heydorn | Last updated Mar 7, 2025 11:53 PM ET

LA Knight is the new WWE United States Champion.

Knight defeated Shinsuke Nakamura on Friday night's episode of Smackdown to win the title. It's his second time holding that championship in WWE.

Knight and Nakamura wrestled in the main event this week and the match ended up going off the rails after Shinsuke misfired with the mist and hit referee Charles Robinson. At that point, Nakamura brought a steel chair into the ring, but it was Knight who ended up using it. He reset the now former Champion back to factory settings by hitting the BFT onto the chair. A second referee ran down to the ring aand counted the 1, 2, 3 to award Knight the victory and the title.

YEAH!

WE HAVE A NEW UNITED STATES CHAMPION!!!#SmackDown pic.twitter.com/Q5SpXFu9q1
— WWE (@WWE) March 8, 2025

Nakamura defeated LA Knight to win the US title back at Survivor Series in November. Nakamura only successfully defended the championship one time and that was because he was disqualified from the match. That match was also against Knight.

This week's episode of Smackdown was a busy one. Not only was there this major title change, but Naomi was revealed as the Jade Cargill attacker. Naomi admitted she injured Cargill and put her on the shelf because she was angry at how Cargill was interacting with Bianca Belair. Cargill returned to WWE at Elimination Chamber and destroyed Naomi and forcing her to retire from the women's chamber match.

With everybody sayin'...

U-S CHAMP! YEAH!#AndNew #SmackDown pic.twitter.com/mUmWx3PIF5
— WWE (@WWE) March 8, 2025

Also this week, Cody Rhodes made his first WWE appearance since being blindsided and attacked by The Rock and newly minted heel, John Cena at Elimination Chamber.

This article first appeared on Wrestling on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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