The Crush Gals were a professional wrestling tag team consisting of Lioness Asuka and Chigusa Nagayo. Formed in 1983 in the All Japan Women's Pro-Wrestling promotion, the Crush Gals would become an extremely popular and influential unit throughout the 1980s, helping to propel both themselves and AJW into mainstream popularity in Japan. The Crush Gals, who combined youthfulness and an exciting wrestling style with pop music, became teen idols and developed a cult following amongst teenage girls in Japan. Helping the Crush Gals to achieve their initial success was AJW pitting them against contrasting antagonists such as Dump Matsumoto and her Atrocious Alliance stable; a group made up of slightly older women portraying violent, imitating face-painted characters inspired by the Sukeban subculture.
The Crush Gals were one of the primary attractions to AJW until their forced breakup in May 1989; AJW's internal policy that their performers must retire upon reaching the age of 26 saw both Asuka and Nagayo taking a hiatus from professional wrestling.