International Wrestling Grand Prix or in shorter form, IWGP. It is a governing body that is synonymous with New Japan Pro-Wrestling for a very long time. It would also be the symbol for all of their titles like mostly notably, the IWGP Heavyweight Championship, IWGP Junior Heavyweight Championship, etc. This has been a theme for a six of fifteen titles in New Japan with the exception of the NEVER titles, STRONG titles and TAMASHII tag titles... And the NJPW World TV Championship as it's not under the governing body as well. The IWGP titles are held in extremely high regard, no matter what title it is and in 2022, New Japan decided to expand to a different branch.
That different branch is women's wrestling as NJPW and STARDOM would bring the IWGP Women's Championship into the wrestling world. This title has been to showcase the best of the best in women's wrestling, mostly in STARDOM. KAIRI was the first champion with the only Gaijin in the lineage, Mercedes Mone following suit. Mayu Iwatani is the best wrestler with the title in my opinion as she held it for 735 days and increased the title's prestige by a shit ton as a result. Syuri is the only person to hold the title twice and is currently the 6th IWGP Women's Champion and 7th NJPW STRONG Women's Champion. With Syuri being a 2 time champion, she lost the title to gain that 2nd label and that is where a certain Sun God appears in the light.
Sareee has been consistently regarded as one of the best freelancers in the world of wrestling. She defeated Syuri to win her first IWGP Women's Championship and went on to have at reign of 114 days. She reached V3 in terms of successful title defenses as well as defending it in three promotions. Much like many of previous blogs, I will list all of the matches she had for the IWGP Women's Title when she was the champion and talk about them like usual. So sit back and watch as my shithousery hits the pan.
All Of Sareee's IWGP Women's Championship Matches:
- Syuri (c) vs Sareee (32:49)
- 21/06/2025
- World Wonder Ring Stardom
- Stardom The Conversion 2025
- ZERO: ★★★★★
The first one was when she had her highest rated match against Syuri at Stardom's The Conversion. The match is the basically a slow burner. It took until the first 15 minutes for me to fully engage with it. That is simply because I was watching all three of their matches in one sitting at one point and this was starting to be repeat of their last match at Sareee-ISM. From the 15 minute mark onwards, this really picked up a notch. And both women were laying in everything with Sareee winning the title.
- Sareee (c) vs Konami (18:15)
- 23/08/2025
- World Wonder Ring Stardom
- Stardom 5STAR Grand Prix 2025 - Day 13 (Final)
- ZERO: ★★★★1/4
This was Sareee's first IWGP title defense against H.A.T.E.'s Konami. Konami earned this match after defeating Sareee on the first night of the 5STAR GP. This was the most unique title match of any Sareee defense as the HATE shenanigans made it an interesting obstacle for The Sun God to overcome. Taking into an account, Sareee was also facing someone who is the same type of deranged psychopath in Konami. This was better than what I expected and fun to watch.
- Sareee (c) vs Suzu Suzuki (22:33)
- 06/09/2025
- World Wonder Ring Stardom
- Stardom To The World 2025
- ZERO: ★★★★3/4
13 days later, the leader of Mi Vida Loca, Suzu Suzuki was the next challenger of the IWGP Women's Championship. She and Sareee tied in the 5STAR and now they have 60 minutes to see who is the best wrestler on the roster. I thought this match would be disappointing as Sareee's style can get really formulaic if you really pay attention. However, this match did what I expected, but not in a formulaic fashion which made this compelling. Shoutout to Suzu Suzuki, what a wrestler as well.
- Syuri (c) vs Sareee (13:42)
- 02/10/2025 (aired on 09/10/2025)
- Ring Of Honor
- ROH On HonorClub #136
- ZERO: ★★★★1/2
"After a successful tag team debut last week alongside Alex Windsor, IWGP Women's Champion Sareee makes her ROH singles debut looking to defend the title against her former partner." - Excalibur
Watching ROH since the reboot in 2023 has been a interesting time. I honestly didn't want Sareee defending the title in either Ring Of Honor or AEW, because of who the fuck is booking the show of course. Tony Khan is widely known for not doing well with booking his women's division. This match happened, I was immediately worried. But fair play to Sareee and Alex Windsor, they made the most of their 14 minutes. (I actuallly have a full match description in my personal archive if you want to see it.) The match is available for free on Ring Of Honor's YouTube channel. It's also marked the first time that the IWGP Women's Title was defended in ROH.
- Sareee (c) vs Syuri (14:56)
- 13/10/2025
- New Japan Pro-Wrestling
- NJPW King Of Pro-Wrestling 2025
- ZERO: ★★★★1/2
The final match of Sareee as IWGP Women's Champion was when she debuted in New Japan Pro-Wrestling for the first time. She took on the woman who she'd beat for the title in the first place, Syuri. If you already watched The Conversion, it's basically this match, but shorter. This was longest IWGP Women's Title match in NJPW event in Japan at proximity 15 minutes. That is quite shocking given NJPW's crazy match lengths for big Japanese event.
So this was a fun little blog for the day and I have some funny stuff coming up as I cancelled my first major project. And honestly, thank god. I hope you enjoy this and hope you smile brightly. Thank you for reading this and I'm grateful for your time.
Kind Regards,
ZERO (or Archer)
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