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Syracuse has been almost perfect in singles competition this season. Entering Sunday’s match with Drexel, the Orange were 16-2 in singles in their first three matches, winning 19 sets by a score of either 6-0, 6-1 or 6-2. Fifty-eight percent of SU’s set wins in singles were by that margin.
But against the Dragons, Miyuka Kimoto, SU’s best singles player, didn’t play because of day-to-day muscle soreness. If the Orange were to continue their red-hot nonconference streak, they would need someone to step up.
On Sunday, it was Shiori Ito. Syracuse (4-0, 0-0 Atlantic Coast) snagged its fourth straight win against Drexel (2-1, 0-0 Coastal Athletic Association), propelled by the Japanese native. She added a singles and doubles win to her already impressive 2025 resumé.
“It’s never easy to go on your court and step up when needed,” SU head coach Younes Limam said. “Shiori, Nelly (Knezkova), I think the whole team stepped up and really didn’t let that affect them.”
Against Cornell and James Madison, Syracuse won five of six singles matches. Last Sunday against Fordham, the Orange swept the Rams in singles. Ito, Constance Levivier and Knezkova all entered the match against the Dragons with a 3-0 singles record, the only three players on the team to have accomplished the feat. All seemed to be going to plan for Limam.
However, Kimoto, who was named ACC Player of the Week on March 19, 2024, and qualified for the NCAA Individual Championships last May, didn’t play singles for the second straight week.
Before the singles matches, Syracuse wiped the floor with doubles for the second Sunday in a row after dropping all three against the Dukes on Jan. 25. The pairs of Anastasia Sysoeva and Serafima Shastova and Ito and Knezkova both bageled their Drexel counterparts, winning 6-0.
Levivier and Monika Wojcik won their match 6-1. Yet, the Dragons were coming off four singles victories against Fairleigh Dickinson on Jan. 24 and Siena on Saturday. The job still wasn’t finished for SU.
Ito has been a steady force for the Orange ever since she joined in 2021, garnering over 100 wins in her Syracuse career across singles and doubles. This season, she’s been gradually working her way up Syracuse’s singles train. Against Cornell, she played as the No. 4 single.
Versus James Madison, she moved down to the No. 5 single position. But ever since Kimoto’s been unavailable in singles competition, Ito has slotted in as SU’s No. 3 competitor.
Ito continued her dominance in singles and took the first game against Drexel’s Maddie Ricardo but fell behind 2-1 as she struggled to handle Ricardo’s attacks.
“First set, she did a very good job with her backhand. Very fast, very solid backhand. But I’m thinking I need to be smart that I aim to her forehand,” Ito said.
In the fourth set, after lobbing the ball over the net, Ito immediately took off toward the center service line as she knew Ricardo’s return would be short. Just as she called it, Ricardo’s return fell right in front of her and a simple backhand saw the ball sail away from the Australian native.
Still, Ricardo held a 3-2 lead, which Ito didn’t chip away at immediately. In the sixth game, Ricardo scored three consecutive points to take a 40-0 lead.
Ito returned to the court and took over. From then on, Ricardo’s shots frequently hit outside the white line or drove into the net, separating the two seniors.
Just as she planned, Ito attacked Ricardo’s forehand, often leading to undercooked or wide-of-the-mark shots. Ito took a 4-3 lead before splitting games seven and eight. In the ninth game, Ricardo continued to be either too short or too long with her forehand, which led to Ito’s fourth singles victory of the year.
“Things never go according to plan. You plan something, but I think the resilience of the team and being ready for adversity, it’s part of it. I think we did a good job with it and we got to keep doing that,” Limam said.
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