on the october 22 episode of "smackdown", ziggler started a feud with the debuting tyler breeze, who aligned with summer rae and attacked ziggler. ziggler entered a tournament for the vacant wwe world heavyweight championship, defeating the miz in the first round match before being eliminated by dean ambrose. ziggler and breeze continued their feud, which culminated in a match between the two at survivor series, which ziggler lost. ziggler would then enter a feud with kevin owens with the pair trading victories throughout the rest of december and beginning of 2016. ziggler entered the 2016 royal rumble as the 28th entrant, lasting 7 minutes, but was eliminated by the eventual winner, triple h. the next night on "raw", ziggler faced kevin owens in a losing effort, but defeated him the following two weeks in a row. on the february 15 "raw", ziggler was involved in a fatal five-way match for the intercontinental championship, where owens regained the title after pinning tyler breeze. at fastlane, ziggler challenged owens to a match for the intercontinental championship, which he lost. in the following weeks, ziggler began to re-ignite his feud with the authority, and on the march 14 episode of "raw", he confronted triple h and stephanie mcmahon. this resulted in ziggler being granted a match against triple h where if he won, he could pick his match at wrestlemania (excluding the wwe world heavyweight championship match); however, ziggler lost. at wrestlemania 32, ziggler competed against kevin owens, sami zayn, the miz, stardust, sin cara and zack ryder in a ladder match for the intercontinental championship, which was won by ryder.