With a wrestling show, the opening match can be nearly as important as the main event. While the main event is about finishing the show in a climactic fashion and leaving a lasting impression, you also need to get the audience into the proceedings with a killer start. Get the blood pumping and jumpstart all the energy to carry the next few hours. With WrestleMania being WWE’s biggest show of the year, those opening minutes can sometimes bring us some fantastic matches to get the ball rolling. Here are the openers that truly started the show off right. For the sake of ground rules, we’re counting matches on the official show itself, so no pre-shows or dark matches. The Rockers vs. Haku and The Barbarian (WrestleMania VII) WrestleMania VII was a solid WrestleMania show with an extra hour or so of nothing matches topped on for the sake of getting everyone a paycheck. This opener worked to that advantage, as there was zero story between The Rockers and Bobby Heenan’s goons going in, but they ended up pulling off exactly the kind of match the show needed. It helped that this was the last real gasp of tag team wrestling actually mattering in WWF and just having two teams go out there and put on a solid performance was a regular thing. It also helped that it had a great dynamic that any new viewer could pick up on: the lumbering and powerful heels up against the plucky faces who were smaller but could run rings around them. Lots of fun tag tropes and teamwork thrown in from The Rockers made this work and showed that even before he broke out as a solo star, Shawn Michaels was earning his reputation as Mr. WrestleMania. Bret Hart vs. Owen Hart (WrestleMania X) Bret Hart had an eventful time at Royal Rumble 1994. In the undercard, he and his brother Owen lost when challenging for the tag team titles, causing Owen to snap and brutalize Bret’s hurt leg. Bret then pulled himself together to compete in the Royal Rumble match that night, becoming co-winners with Lex Luger due to falling to the floor at the same time. It was decided that Bret would face Owen at WrestleMania in an exhibition, as he’d then go on to face the winner of Lex Luger vs. Yokozuna in the main event. Owen was already mad about how reluctant Bret was to face him, only now he was madder that Bret was technically looking past him, as he was going to compete for the title, win or lose. On the same night that gave us the legendary ladder match between Shawn Michaels and Razor Ramon, the event peaked early with this battle between brothers. The two put on an excellent show full of amazing ringwork and reversals. That it ended with Owen cleanly getting an upset win was the icing on the cake. Rey Mysterio vs. Eddie Guerrero (WrestleMania 21) Awesome as this one is, it’s also a bittersweet middle to a thematic trilogy between the two competitors. At the previous WrestleMania, Eddie Guerrero successfully defended the WWE Championship and stood tall in the PPV’s final shot. In the months that followed, Eddie fell down the card and ended up as tag champ with Rey Mysterio. To open WrestleMania 21, the two partners had a singles match against each other, trying to stand on the legacy of their classic from Halloween Havoc 1997. While the two didn’t quite reach those heights, they still killed it and showed that they still had that chemistry. Despite Eddie’s best efforts, he couldn’t keep Mysterio down for three and ended up losing to a flash pin, setting the stage for a heel turn and ridiculous storyline centered around the custody of a young Dominik Mysterio. Sadly, this would be Eddie’s final WrestleMania due to a sudden death from heart issues. In the follow-up, Rey Mysterio would win the 2006 Royal Rumble match to make his way to WrestleMania 22, where he would win the World Heavyweight Championship. All the while, it was used as a tribute to his former tag partner and one of his greatest opponents. Money in the Bank (WrestleMania 23) The Money in the Bank concept was introduced at WrestleMania 21 and ended up being a huge success. It wasn’t until its third installment at WrestleMania 23 that they decided to lead with it, and they went full ham by making it an eight-man match. A great set of talent here with initial winner Edge being joined by CM Punk, Randy Orton, King Booker, Finlay, Mr. Kennedy, Jeff Hardy, and Matt Hardy. Then you get Sharmell and Hornswoggle showing up, making this one of the more chaotic takes on the match. There was rarely a bad Money in the Bank match, especially early on, and this one’s no different. They do get silly, like having Booker pull out a tiny ladder in the heat of the moment and the later bit where he could win the match, but Matt Hardy threatens Sharmell with a Twist of Fate unless he steps down. Then you get the crazy spots, like when Edge is laying on a ladder acting as a bridge and Jeff Hardy jumps off another ladder and into Edge. Or the time when Mr. Kennedy does the Green Bay Plunge on Hornswoggle off a ladder. Kennedy himself would end up winning this one, though his aftermath as the briefcase holder was entirely cursed. Finlay vs. JBL (WrestleMania XXIV) Mercifully, WWE was finally putting an end to one of their most grueling ongoing stories about Hornswoggle being Vince McMahon’s illegitimate son. Only it turns out Vince wasn’t the father, as it was really Finlay. Sure. This was all revealed after JBL beat the leprechaun half to death, setting up this “Belfast Brawl,” which is quite a sentence I just typed. After months and months of awful McMahon sketches and segments, we were at least going to get a cool hardcore match out of it. We’ll take our wins where we can get them. Join our mailing list Get the best of Den of Geek delivered right to your inbox! It’s rare for WrestleMania to start off with a plunder match, but this one really gets the crowd going thanks to it being two stiff workers who can take it as much as they can dish it out. This also gives us the fantastic moment where JBL is in the ring with a trash can, sees Hornswoggle scrambling around on the outside, and just whips the can at him at lightning speed. JBL winning might have been seen as a downer, but putting this whole angle out of its misery was something to be celebrated. Daniel Bryan vs. Triple H (WrestleMania XXX) The road to WrestleMania XXX was like somebody falling down the stairs, somehow landing on their feet, and insisting that they meant to do that. Daniel Bryan was meant to be swept under the rug as a top guy, but between CM Punk’s abrupt exodus from the company, the fanbase’s complete rejection of Batista as the top face, and an utterly disastrous Royal Rumble, they ended up being bullied into a fantastic main event storyline centering around Bryan winning the WWE World Heavyweight Championship against Randy Orton and Batista. But that wasn’t his only match of the night. In order to earn his spot in the main event, he had to face evil boss Triple H at the start of the show. It was their one and only match together, which made it more of a novelty to see so early on. The two jibed perfectly and we got one of the last truly great matches in Triple H’s career. Even though this was Bryan’s match to win, Triple H’s tendency to use his real life backstage sway mixed with how many times Bryan’s fans had been burned threw in a non-zero chance that the hero wasn’t going to pull it off. Seth Rollins vs. Finn Balor vs. The Miz (WrestleMania 34) When done right, a triple threat match can really complement what the talent brings to the table. Seth Rollins and Finn Balor once had a great match to crown the first ever Universal Champion. Here, they were fighting for Miz’s Intercontinental Championship and by throwing the extra guy in there, it just allowed for a fast-paced match full of inventive spots and the ability to trade out a wrestler to rest up before jumping back into the fray. Even with Miz being the weakest of the three wrestlers, he still adds a fantastic dynamic of being the one who takes advantage of the situation. Lots of moments of him trying to be an opportunist, including a wonderful spot where Rollins just barely escapes a roll-up pin from Balor, and is so distraught and distracted by making sure the ref only counted to two that it leaves him open for a sudden Skull-Crushing Finale. The extra man keeps spoiling the pinfalls until it’s time for Rollins to flatten both opponents one after another with his Curb Stomp. Seth Rollins vs. Brock Lesnar (WrestleMania 35) Brock Lesnar was at one point the ultimate threat in WWE. At the same time, Seth Rollins was being built up as a top face and was challenging him for the Universal Championship. Despite the high-profile nature of this bout, the narrative, according to Paul Heyman, was that Brock was pissed about not being the main event. If he wasn’t going to be the main event, he would open the show so he could be done with things early and skip town. Brock was so furious that he jumped Rollins during the entrance and unfairly destroyed him before the bell could even ring. Rollins insisted on going through with the match and turned things around with an illegal punch to the balls. It was cheating, but it was justified. Rollins then spammed his Curb Stomp three times in a row to keep Brock down, winning the title in just a couple of minutes. Rollins would eventually beat Brock fair and square to give him that major rub (immediately undone by his Fiend feud), but this quick and impactful win was definitely a great start to the PPV. Drew McIntyre vs. Bobby Lashley (WrestleMania 37) WrestleMania 37 Night 1 had a very unique situation going on at the start. For one, this was the first major WWE show since the pandemic that had a full crowd. By default, this crowd starting off WrestleMania would be off the wall pumped. The problem was that there was a nasty storm that caused a major delay, and by the time they were ready to do the actual wrestling, the crowd was wet and defused. It wasn’t instantaneous, but Drew McIntyre and Bobby Lashley going at it eventually woke them up. Two big, meaty men slapping meat will do that sometimes. A great pairing who played off each other well, they did a good job making both of them seem like irresistible forces and immovable objects at the same time. It did involve a screwy finish, but Lashley being able to knock out Drew with the Hurt Lock really put a bow on how dominating the Almighty could be. Definitely better than the following night’s goofball Randy Orton vs. Fiend match and its “box-like structure” bullshit. Becky Lynch vs. Rhea Ripley (WrestleMania XL) Fun fact, it wasn’t until WrestleMania 36 that a women’s match started off one of these shows. Even then, Alexa Bliss and Nikki Cross vs. The Kabuki Warriors had no crowd to win over thanks to that pesky COVID thing that just made a mess of the world. We wouldn’t see any women fight it out at the beginning until the 40th WrestleMania in what was arguably the biggest potential match that WWE could put together with that division. On one side, it was Rhea Ripley, who had an incredibly lengthy and popular run as WWE Women’s World Champion. On the other side, it was Becky Lynch, the woman who once won the main event of WrestleMania and was fresh off releasing her autobiography. It was a hard-hitting passing of the torch that’s way more impressive when you realize that Becky was also battling through strep throat that week. Even with that handicap, the two started the show off with a bang.