The Queen's Crown tournament is a women's

professional wrestling Professional wrestling is a form of theater that revolves around staged wrestling matches. The mock combat is performed in a ring similar to the kind used in boxing, and the dramatic aspects of pro wrestling may be performed both in the ring o ...

single-elimination tournament A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...

held by

WWE World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., d/b/a as WWE, is an American professional wrestling promotion. A global integrated media and entertainment company, WWE has also branched out into other fields, including film, American football, and vario ...

, a

Connecticut Connecticut () is the southernmost state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, New York to the west, and Long Island Sound to the south. Its cap ...

-based

professional wrestling promotion A professional wrestling promotion is a company or business that regularly performs shows involving professional wrestling that has little relationship to the rules of the amateur olympic form. "Promotion" also describes a role which entails man ...

. Established in 2021, the prize for winning the tournament is earning the moniker of "Queen". It is considered the

female Female (Venus symbol, symbol: ♀) is the sex of an organism that produces the large non-motile ovum, ova (egg cells), the type of gamete (sex cell) that fuses with the Sperm, male gamete during sexual reproduction. A female has larger gamet ...

version of WWE's long-standing

King of the Ring tournament The King of the Ring tournament is a men's professional wrestling single-elimination tournament held periodically by WWE, a Connecticut-based professional wrestling promotion. Established in 1985, the winner of the inaugural tournament was Don M ...

for male wrestlers. Like the King of the Ring tournament, female wrestlers from the

Raw Raw is an adjective usually describing: * Raw materials, basic materials from which products are manufactured or made * Raw food, uncooked food Raw or RAW may also refer to: Computing and electronics * .RAW, a proprietary mass spectrometry dat ...

and

SmackDown ''WWE SmackDown'', also known as ''Friday Night SmackDown'' or simply ''SmackDown'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE that as of currently airs live every Friday at 8 p.m. ET on Fox. Fox Deportes simulc ...

brand divisions participate. The inaugural tournament, consisting of eight female wrestlers, began on the October 8, 2021, episode of ''

''. Taking place across episodes of ''

'' and ''SmackDown'', the tournament culminated at the Crown Jewel

pay-per-view Pay-per-view (PPV) is a type of pay television or webcast service that enables a viewer to pay to watch individual events via private telecast. Events can be purchased through a multichannel television platform using their electronic program guid ...

and

livestreaming Livestreaming is streaming media simultaneously recorded and broadcast in real-time over the internet. It is often referred to simply as streaming. Non-live media such as video-on-demand, vlogs, and YouTube videos are technically streamed, but no ...

event, where SmackDown's

Zelina Vega Thea Megan Trinidad Büdgen (born December 27, 1990) is an American professional wrestler and actress. She is currently signed to WWE, where she performs on the SmackDown brand under the ring name Zelina Vega, and is a member of Legado Del Fan ...

defeated Raw's

Doudrop Kimberly Benson (born 6 May 1991) is a Scottish professional wrestler. She is currently signed to WWE, where she performs on the Raw brand under the ring name Doudrop. Benson began her career on the independent circuit under the name Viper; aft ...

to become the inaugural Queen.

History

In 1985, the American

, at that time known as the World Wrestling Federation (WWF), established the

as a men's

, the winner of which is crowned the "King of the Ring". In 2016, the " Women's Evolution" began in WWE, where the promotion began to treat their female wrestlers on an equal level as the men. In the years following this, WWE introduced female versions of matches that were originally only contested by male wrestlers—such as the

Royal Rumble match The Royal Rumble match is a professional wrestling match based on the classic Battle Royal match in which a number of wrestlers (traditionally 30) aim at eliminating their competitors by tossing them over the top rope, with both feet touching the ...

and

Money in the Bank ladder match The Money in the Bank ladder match is a multi-person ladder match held by the professional wrestling promotion WWE. First contested at WWE's annual WrestleMania event beginning in 2005, a separate Money in the Bank pay-per-view was established ...

. In October 2021, WWE established a female counterpart to the King of the Ring tournament, called the Queen's Crown tournament, held between wrestlers from the

and

brand divisions. The inaugural tournament was announced to be held simultaneously with the 2021 King of the Ring tournament.

Queen gimmick

Similar to the King of the Ring tournament, the prize for winning the Queen's Crown tournament is earning the title of "Queen", though unlike the King of the Ring tournament, the winner is simply called "Queen" instead of "Queen of the Ring". As several King of the Ring winners have taken on a king's gimmick with varying degrees of indulgence, inaugural Queen's Crown winner

adopted a queen's gimmick and began to refer to herself as Queen Zelina. She began wearing a crown, a cape, and carrying a scepter, while speaking and acting in a regal manner, though acting more like a tyrannical queen due to Vega portraying a

heel The heel is the prominence at the posterior end of the foot. It is based on the projection of one bone, the calcaneus or heel bone, behind the articulation of the bones of the lower Human leg, leg. Structure To distribute the compressive for ...

. After taking a brief hiatus in mid-2022, Vega returned in October and dropped the queen gimmick.

2021 tournament

The 2021 Queen's Crown was the inaugural edition of the Queen's Crown tournament. Consisting of eight female wrestlers, four each from the Raw and SmackDown brands, the tournament was divided into two brackets, one for each brand, and the winners of each bracket faced each other in the final. The inaugural tournament began on the October 8 episode of ''SmackDown'' and continued to be held across episodes of ''

'' and ''SmackDown''. It concluded at the Crown Jewel

and

event on October 21, 2021. In the final, SmackDown's

defeated Raw's

to become the inaugural winner.

Bracket

Reception

The Queen's Crown tournament was heavily criticized by fans for not being on equal ground with the men's King of the Ring tournament. The length of the tournament's first six matches were a combined 13 minutes and 40 seconds, equaling an average of roughly two minutes and 15 seconds per match. This is in stark contrast to the first six matches of the King of the Ring tournament, where none were shorter than eight minutes.

References

{{WWE Tournaments 2021 in professional wrestling October 2021 events in the United States Women in WWE Women's professional wrestling tournaments WWE Network events WWE tournaments