NOVA Pro Wrestling began on Friday, September 25, 2015, with its first show, "The NOVA Project", taking place at the Jewish Community Center of Northern Virginia, in Fairfax. The event was presented by the Virginia promotion Ground Xero Wrestling (GXW), and was run using their promoter's license and much of their equipment. The first show, casually referred to as a
pilot episode, was considered a borderline success, despite several last minute changes to the card. This was primarily due to issues related to Virginia's licensing committee, as the show took place with only one of the originally advertised matches taking place as planned. NOVA Pro waited until the new year to run again, this time with their own promoter's license. The first show of 2016, titled "Stay Vicious", ran on Sunday, January 31, 2016, from the Annandale Sports Center in
Springfield, Virginia. The promotion would continue to run, both in Springfield and Fairfax, every other month until July, when the frequency increased to monthly shows, as the crowds continued to grow. The company celebrated their one-year anniversary with "The NOVA Project 2" on September 16, 2016, which featured the first steel cage match in the promotion's history, capping off a year-long feud between
Sonjay Dutt and Logan Easton Laroux. The last show of the calendar year took place on Black Friday, November 25, 2016, and featured one of the last independent wrestling appearances of
Chris Hero before his second stint with the WWE. 2017 began for NOVA Pro Wrestling, with "RELoad" on Friday, February 17, 2017 drawing one of its biggest crowds at a brand new venue, the Annandale Volunteer Fire Department in
Annandale, Virginia. This location would split time with the original Fairfax location for the year, with NOVA's return to Fairfax hosting the first ever
Commonwealth Cup on Friday, April 14, 2017. The one-night, 12-man tournament was won by Logan Easton Laroux, and was made even more significant by his win in the finals over Arik Royal, who had previously been undefeated in NOVA Pro since its inception in 2015. 2017 continued to be a year of firsts for NOVA Pro, as the company slowly discovered its identity. June 10, 2017 featured the first ever tryout show, "Life Is Like A Box of Chocolates", with a full NOVA Pro show, "Hi Fidelity", later that evening as well. The show "American Slang '17", on July 14, was main evented by NOVA's first ever ladder match, between PWI Ultra J Champion Chet Sterling and Logan Easton Laroux. "Cool for the Summer", on August 18, 2017, marked the company's first ever sold-out crowd, and was headlined by a No Disqualification intergender match between Angelus Layne and
Keith Lee. This match came about as the focal point of a feud between Layne and promoter Mike E. King, after Layne threw a fireball at the promoter's face one month earlier. Lee was brought in to face Layne in the first intergender main event, though not the first or only instance of intergender wrestling in the promotion's history. Friday, September 22, 2017 marked a second consecutive sell-out crowd, this time in the larger Fairfax venue, for "The NOVA Project 3". As the promotion entered its third year of operation, it enjoyed significant growth in exposure thanks to features in
The Washington Post and
Washington City Paper, as well as many national outlets, in part thanks to appearances from viral sensation
"The Progressive Liberal" Daniel Richards. Around this time, the promotion signed with streaming service Powerbomb.TV to make past shows available on the site, and announce their first
live-streamed show on Thursday, December 28, 2017, main evented by Powerbomb TV Independent Champion
Jonathan Gresham defending against Sonjay Dutt. In June 2018, NOVA Pro produced both a men's and women's Commonwealth Cup, although the early rounds of the Women's Cup were not available live as the show was a matinee. In addition, in September, it was announced that NOVA Pro would do a show outside Virginia for the first time as the company would perform as part of
WrestleMania 35 weekend. == Events ==