WWE SmackDown live updates, recap as Natalya and Tamina challenge for women’s tag championship

On Friday night, WWE held the WrestleMania Backlash go-home edition of SmackDown. In the main event, Cesaro clashed with Jimmy Uso in Uso’s first match in well over a year, but the story of the night was the continued drama surrounding Roman Reigns and the Usos ahead of Reigns’ title defense against Cesaro on Sunday.

Jimmy Uso pleaded with his twin brother Jey to stop following Reigns and instead be his own man. Reigns, of course, took issue with Jimmy’s statements and tried to force his cousin to instead recognize his place at the head of the family table. In the end, the drama escalated until Reigns was unwilling to save Jey as Cesaro delivered multiple Neutralizers to end the show, sending a final message to Reigns ahead of their title match.

CBS Sports was with you all night, bringing you recaps and highlights of all the action from the ThunderDome inside Tampa’s Yuengling Center.

Roman Reigns’ family drama continues

Jey Uso opened the show with an in-ring promo, saying he’d have to take care of some “family business” after his brother Jimmy disrespected Roman Reigns last week. Jey then welcomed Reigns to the ring, where the universal champion addressed his upcoming match with Cesaro at WrestleMania Backlash, vowing victory before turning his attention to Jimmy, who also made his way to the ring. Jimmy and Reigns went back and forth as Jimmy refused to acknowledge Reigns’ place as “head of the table.” Finally, Reigns said that if Jimmy believes he can do what the champion does, he should prove it by facing Cesaro later in the show.

Cesaro def. Jimmy Uso via disqualification after interference from Roman Reigns. Jimmy was wrestling his first match in 14 months and showed most of his old tricks, including faking a knee injury to create an opening for a superkick. Once Cesaro seemed to have the match in hand, Reigns ran in to attack Cesaro from behind for the disqualification. Jimmy stormed off, telling Reigns he had to make everything about himself again. As Jimmy and Roman argued, Cesaro attacked Jey. Reigns demanded Jimmy get in the ring and help as he and Jey continued the attack. Jimmy came to the apron after seeing Jey attacked, eating a Cesaro superkick for his trouble. Cesaro then hit Jey with the Neutralizer as he told Reigns it would be his fate on Sunday. Cesaro dared Reigns to do something before hitting a second neutralizer as Reigns only looked on.

It’s no surprise that Reigns and the Usos delivered more compelling storyline work through the show. At this point, great Reigns segments are the expectation every week. Cesaro has more than held his own as the uber babyface looking to finally break through to the championship level and without being over the top contributed to the continued tension in Reigns’ family by showing that Reigns will not involve himself to save his cousins if it could put him in danger. Just solid stuff all around. Grade: A-

What else happened on WWE SmackDown?