A Look Back: Team WWF vs The Alliance (Survivor Series 2001)

I truly love Survivor Series, and the main reason why I love the event is the signature elimination tag team matches. The matches are usually 5-on-5, though we have seen some 4-on-4 matches in some events. In the early years, the Survivor Series card solely consisted of these type of matches, but nowadays, we get singles bouts to go with the small number of these elimination matches. In some years, the traditional match (depending on the star power) served as the main event. 2001 was definitely no exception.

The 2001 Survivor Series only had one traditional elimination match, but it was a big one. 2001 saw the Invasion angle dominate the then-named World Wrestling Federation, resulting in a battle between two companies: the WWF and The Alliance, which consisted mainly of talent from World Championship Wrestling (WCW) and Extreme Championship Wrestling (ECW). It would all come to a head on the evening of November 18, 2001, but let's look at how this started.

The Origin: March of 2001 saw WCW fold, and Vince McMahon was proud; he had beaten the competition, and he was set to own what was left of WCW, only for his son, Shane McMahon, to beat him to the punch. Shane's purchase of WCW was part of a feud with Vince, which Shane originally acting as a face in the angle. As for WCW, their former talent often appeared in the final 20 minutes of Raw, but the reaction was immensely negative. Even so, Shane and the WCW talent were continued to be portrayed as faces counteracting against Vince and certain villainous WWF talent, but again, the negative reaction continued.

ECW's talent later entered the fray and invaded the WWF, leading Vince to acquire Shane's help in taking out ECW. To Vince's surprise, Shane actually ordered his WCW talent to attack the WWF wrestlers, and afterwards, he revealed that he had orchestrated everything and that WCW and ECW (along with Paul Heyman, who had replaced Jerry Lawler on commentary prior to the angle) were in cahoots--with Shane's sister, Stephanie McMahon portraying the villainous owner of ECW. So with that, The Alliance was born, and they served as an evil corporation bent on running Vince and the WWF out of business.

A "Stone Cold" Acquisition: The Alliance became even more powerful when a surprising name defected from WWF to join them: "Stone Cold" Steve Austin. At the time, Austin had been a heel since WrestleMania X-Seven, and had actually aligned with Vince McMahon and Triple H, though Triple H's injury put him back on his own again. When the Invasion/Alliance angle began, and the Invasion PPV was closing in, Vince wanted Austin to lead the Federation against The Alliance. To make it more clear, he wanted the old Texas Rattlesnake; the beer-swilling, take no prisoners rabble-rouser. Austin was not that. Austin had been portrayed as someone who whined about not getting respect, and complained that Vince wasn't valuing him as his top guy anymore.

Even so, it seemed that we got that back, and it seemed that he was all in during the five-on-five main event. However, when Kurt Angle had it won, Austin delivered a Stunner to his partner, helping The Alliance win, and later joining them! So not only did The Alliance get WWF's top guy, they also had the WWF Championship as well.

The Proposal: The tit-for-tat between the WWF and The Alliance continued for several months until finally, Vince decided to put it all on the line in a match at Survivor Series--a 5-on-5 elimination match pitting the WWF vs The Alliance. The stipulation was simple: the winning side stayed in business, the losing side folded. There were many problems within the WWF side; the biggest one being the sudden and surprise defection of Kurt Angle. Angle, who had been the top competitor on the WWF side (and had even briefly dethroned Austin as champion) attacked his WWF teammates with a steel chair, and became part of The Alliance.

Angle stated that he couldn't trust his professional fate in the hands of a combustible team, and in the weeks leading to Survivor Series, that's what the WWF side was being portrayed as: combustible. The main source came from The Rock and Chris Jericho, as they had been feuding with each other over the WCW Championship, which Jericho won briefly from Rock until losing the belt back to Rock weeks later. The Undertaker and Kane being on Team WWF helped things, but Angle's betrayal left a vacancy on the team. Vince himself was set to compete, but he had to bow out due to injury, so The Big Show took his place. Team Alliance was represented by Austin, Angle, Booker T, Rob Van Dam (who was the Hardcore Champion at the time), and Shane McMahon (whose presence led to the original plan to have Vince compete in the match).

The Match: The 2001 Survivor Series featured a pair of Title Unification matches, Trish Stratus capturing her first of seven Women's Championships, and an immunity battle royal, but of course, the main event was the Winner Take All match. I loved a lot of things about this main event, including the announcers. Jim Ross and Paul Heyman were on the call; as I mentioned earlier, Heyman replaced Jerry "The King" Lawler following King's abrupt and brief exit, and had been an ordinary heel announcer until the Invasion angle made him the voice of The Alliance. With the stakes so high in this match, we would be treated to a lot of hilarious banter between JR and Heyman, which was just amazing.

We also saw shots of the war rooms; the WWF and Alliance locker rooms watching the bout, which saw Shane McMahon do everything except actually tag himself in. When Shane finally did tag himself in, it was to pick up the pieces after his Alliance partners had beaten down Big Show, leading to the first elimination when Shane got the three-count on Show. Shane's celebration was cut short, however, when The Rock pummeled Shane inside the ring, followed by a chokeslam from Kane, a Tombstone Piledriver by Undertaker, and a Lionsault from Jericho eliminating the WCW owner.

So similar to the result of matching minor penalties in hockey, it was 4-on-4. However, that's where the problems began, as Team Alliance was able to eliminate not one, but both Brothers of Destruction, leaving just Rock and Jericho to defend the WWF. This led to Heyman repeating that Rock and Jericho couldn't get along, and that was the narrative entering the event. However, they were able to get Booker and RVD out of the equation, leaving just the top four guys in this match: Rock and Jericho for WWF, and Austin and Angle for The Alliance. Both pairs fought back and forth, and their battle would see Angle eliminated, giving Team WWF a man advantage for the first time. Afterwards, Jericho ended up eliminated by Austin, bring it down to Rock and Austin--yet another chapter in that rivalry.

That's when it happened: Jericho face-planted Rock following his elimination, nearly costing WWF the match, though Rock kicked out of Austin's pin attempt at 2. Jericho's attempt to get back in and finish the job was thwarted by The Undertaker, who sent Jericho to the back while Rock and Austin battled. A lot more chaos followed, including Alliance referee Nick Patrick pulling Earl Hebner out during Rock's pin attempt. Austin later delivered the Rock Bottom to Rock, but that only got a two count, resulting in Austin decking Patrick and trying to bring Hebner back in. Austin delivered the Stunner, but at that moment, Angle resurfaced and picked up Austin's WWF title...and struck his Alliance ally with the belt. A Rock Botton followed, and three seconds later, Team WWF was victorious, and The Alliance was no more.

Aftermath: Survivor Series has always had an interesting and lasting aftermath, but the fallout from the 2001 event had to be the most impactful. So with The Alliance kaput, a lot of changes were made. First off, The Rock's WCW Championship was renamed the World Championship, and regarding the night after on Raw, Vince fired Heyman and brought back Lawler, though he ended the evening with plans to strip Austin of the WWF title and award it to Angle for his "efforts" in saving the Federation. Both men would be interrupted by Ric Flair, who was making his first WWF appearance in eight years, and it was followed by the announcement that Flair had purchased Shane and Stephanie's shares of the company, making him partners with Vince. Austin appeared and beat down both Angle and Vince before regaining his title, and as a result, Austin was back to being a face, while Vince was a heel again and had Angle as one of his "boys," as JR put it on commentary.

Another heel turn came after Survivor Series, and surprisingly, it was The Undertaker. Vince had been subjecting former Alliance members to join his "Kiss My Ass" Club (yes, that turns 20 as well), with William Regal (the former WWF Commissioner who defected to The Alliance in October of that year) being the first member. Austin was set to be next, but he lowblowed Vince and whipped him with a belt before escaping the wrath of a group of former Alliance members. Vince and Angle took notice of JR's enjoyment over the whole thing, leading the pair to force JR in and take what was supposed to be Austin's humiliation, only for The Undertaker to enter. The Deadman vented over his 11 years of taking Vince's nonsense, but in a shocker, he attacked JR and forced him to join Vince's club. Undertaker began his final run as a heel that evening; he would turn face in the summer of 2002 and continue that run until his retirement at Survivor Series 2020.

As I also mentioned, Survivor Series featured Title Unification matches, but the world titles weren't combined. Flair decided to have Rock and Austin fight each other to crown the first-ever Undisputed Champion, but Vince decided to add Angle and Jericho to the mix. Angle would challenge Austin for the WWF title, Jericho would challenge Rock for the World Championship, and the winners would face each other. All of that took place at Vengeance, and the result was Jericho defeating Rock and Austin in one night to become the first Undisputed Champion. Regarding the Survivor Series 2001 main event, I've seen it too many times to count. It's my favorite of the Survivor Series elimination matches, mainly because of the participants alone--five WWE Hall of Famers in that match, and four eventual Hall of Famers as well. I also loved that it brought a definitive end to a terrific angle that, even now, has a lasting effect in what is now known as World Wrestling Entertainment.

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