Top 10 Intercontinental Title matches in WrestleMania History
This Sunday night at WrestleMania 34, The Miz will be defending the Intercontinental Championship in a triple threat match against Finn Balor and Seth Rollins in only the second triple threat for the IC Title in WrestleMania history. The first one, back in 2000, also involved the European Championship, which technically makes this the first pure IC Title triple threat match at a WrestleMania event. It will be the 24th defense of the Intercontinental Championship in 34 WrestleManias.
A quick history: The IC Title was defended at the first 11 WrestleMania events. They skipped WM XIi and then it was defended at the next 6 events. After WrestleMania x8 in 2002, it wasn’t defended for 6 straight WrestleManias, and in its return to the event, the title changed hands in only 20 seconds. It has been defended three times in a Ladder Match, and the champion walked in with the belt and successfully defended it (including disqualifications and count outs) in 12 of the 23 matches, putting it at just over half.
Will Seth Rollins or Finn Balor succeed in being the man to tie it up at 12 successful retentions and 12 successful title changes? We will find out this Sunday. In the meantime, let's weed out the best of the best and see which comes out on top.
#10 Tatanka def. Champ Shawn Michaels via count-out (WrestleMania IX, 1993)
Shawn Michaels had dropped Marty Jannetty the year before and started his run as a heel. The previous WrestleMania saw him open the show in a good match against Tito Santana. Here, he takes on another stereotype, defending his Intercontinental Championship against Native American Tatanka.
By this point, Shawn was over a year into his time as a bad guy and had dropped Sensational Sherri, the woman who turned him into the “sexy boy” as his valet. In fact, his manager for this match was Luna Vachon, while Tatanka was led to the ring by Sensational Sherri herself.
To note, this was before he started using the superkick as a finisher, although this match ended with a disqualification. Tatanka was on a winning streak but they wanted to keep the title on Michaels, so this happened. Imagine a time where Tatanka is being protected in a match against Shawn Michaels. This is the best match from what is remembered by most as the worst WrestleMania ever. It’s a really good one, though, and worth checking out, especially if you want some classic early Shawn Michaels singles action.