Classic Match: Lita vs. Victoria (Steel Cage Match), Monday Night RAW
RondaRousey.com’s Classic Match series takes a closer look at significant and super cool matches from wrestling history.
This week’s classic match was a historic moment for WWE’s women’s division at the time, as it was the company’s first Steel Cage match between two women. On November 23, 2004, Lita faced Victoria in a cage on a unique episode of Monday Night RAW.
While new stipulations for WWE women’s matches in the present day are usually intentionally chosen to make history or assigned by authority figures when they think they fit a feud between women, the company’s first women’s Steel Cage match came about entirely by chance. November 23 was a special RAW Roulette episode of WWE’s flagship show, a gimmick dreamed up by General Manager Eric Bischoff in which each match had a stipulation determined by a spin of a wheel. In the episode’s opening segment, Bischoff said his goal was to create “the most outrageous matches you’ve ever seen” over “the most exciting, titillating two hours on television.”
Although Lita vs. Victoria had already been scheduled for this episode of RAW, Bischoff added a vindictive, last-minute twist. Lita had been out of in-ring action for about a year with a neck injury, and during that time she had also been fired by Bischoff from a commentary position after she refused his sexual advances and declined to pose for Playboy. The previous week, the former Women’s Champion returned to competition when she and her boyfriend, Matt Hardy, wrestled Bischoff and current champ Molly Holly. The Raw GM added that Lita would earn a title shot if she won but would be fired if she lost. As if she didn’t already have enough problems, Hardy lost Lita the match when he refused to tag in and then accused her of caring more about the Women’s Championship than about him.
Lita was rehired later in the episode when Christian used a favor to get Bischoff to reinstate her, but clearly, this didn’t end the GM’s vendetta. With a spin of the roulette wheel by Holly, Lita’s second match back could be won by pinfall, submission, or escaping a steel cage (either through the door or by climbing out).
The normally fearless Lita looked nervous as the stipulation, for which she had no chance to train or prepare, was announced, but her opponent looked anything but. Victoria had debuted back in 2000 as one of The Godfather’s hos but reentered WWE in 2002 to quickly become one of the most dominant Divas of the Ruthless Aggression Era. She had immediately gone into a vicious feud with Trish Stratus based on their shared history in fitness competitions and had won the Women’s Championship less than six months later. Her intensity in the ring, devastating Widow’s Peak finisher, and unhinged character made her a standout figure in WWE’s women’s division and a force to be reckoned with.
Lita started the match by aggressively throwing Victoria into the side of the cage. But Victoria also used the structure to her advantage, slingshotting her opponent into the wall as Jerry Lawler on commentary asked, “Can you imagine what the sides of that cage would do to her pretty face?”
After both women tried and failed to win via pinfall, they instead tried to escape. Lita prevented Victoria from escaping through the door, and Victoria halted Lita’s climb. After an exchange of a few wrestling moves, a powerbomb from Lita again stopped Victoria from scaling the structure. After a moonsault, Lita made a run for the door, but the other vengeful man in her life—her ex-boyfriend Matt Hardy—showed up to slam the door in her face.
Victoria took the opportunity to crawl out the doorway and pick up the win. Hardy ran into the cage, looking like he might attack Lita, but Christian appeared to make the save for the woman who would soon become his storyline love interest.
Although this short match is pretty entertaining in itself, it showcases the tropes of how WWE presented women in a way that often prevented their work from being respected. The historic battle didn’t get a lot of time (about five minutes, bell-to-bell) and served a few of the time period’s many romance and sexual harassment-themed storylines. Overall, the women wrestlers weren’t yet presented in a way that allowed their performances to shine without being overshadowed by the more prioritized men.
You can go back and revisit this match (and the entirety of the November 24, 2003 episode of RAW) on the WWE Network.