After that, he was sent back down to the developmental territory, the former FCW, which was rebranded into NXT Wrestling. He debuted on NXT in a losing effort against Seth Rollins. He won a match later on the same episode in a six-man tag match when he teamed with Hunico and Michael McGillicutty against Rollins, Bo Dallas and Tyson Kidd. He defeated Kidd in a singles match following a distraction from McGillicutty on the following episode of NXT.