by Rob Dinerman, College Squash Historian
The Intercollegiate Individuals champion in 2022 (and a finalist two other times), Sivasangari “Siva” Subramaniam’s squash (and life) journey is even more remarkable for what she has accomplished off the court than on it. The resiliency she has shown— and the adversity she has conquered — has made her one of the most compelling figures in the history of college squash.
A highly touted college recruit after winning both the British Junior Open Under-19 crown and her native Malaysia’s national senior championship in 2018, Subramaniam reached the College Individuals final as a Cornell freshman in 2019, upsetting No. 1 seed Sabrina Sobhy in the semis before losing to Sobhy’s Harvard teammate Gina Kennedy in the final. After losing to Hana Moataz in the 2020 Individuals semifinals, Subramaniam then faced Moataz again two years later in the 2022 Individuals finals after the entire 2020-21 college season had been canceled due to the Covid pandemic. With each player hoping to win the title after losing a prior Individuals final to Kennedy (Subramaniam in 2019 and Moataz in 2020), their championship match was a classic between the tournament’s top two seeds.
The first two games were one-sided (Subramaniam 11-4, then Moataz 11-2), but the last three were airtight and extremely high-quality. Subramaniam won the third game by cracking a forehand winner down the right wall at 10-9, but in the fourth Moataz, trailing 10-7, saved a combined four match balls to escape 14-12. The fifth seesawed dangerously and evenly along, showcasing a classic contrast in styles: Moataz, the determined grinder, projected a formidable physical presence, while the slender and sinewy Subramanian flowed (rather than powered) to the ball, conjuring up clever angles and precise placements. Trailing 6-7, Subramaniam surged through the final five points, finishing the match off with a backhand straight drop shot that nicked at too severe an angle for Moataz to respond. Subramaniam thereby became the first player, man or woman, to win the Intercollegiate Individuals championship in the history of Cornell squash.
At the time (in late February 2022), Subramaniam seemed on top of the world, her game surging by leaps and bounds under the expert tutelage of Cornell head coach (and former multiple-times British Open and World Open champion) David Palmer, with nothing but a dazzlingly-bright future ahead of her. No one could have known what a cruel twist was lurking.
Four months later, in June, Subramaniam was involved in a life-threatening car crash that injured her so severely that the doctors who ministered to her feared that she might never walk again, much less return to competitive squash. In addition to incurring several facial fractures, she sustained a fracture of her C1 vertebra, the crucial first vertebra in the cervical spine, located at the top of the neck, where the head meets the spine. She had to wear a neck collar for several months and needed her mother’s help dressing and bathing.
After undergoing daily physical therapy treatment at her home in Malaysia through the first semester of the 2022-23 academic year, Subramaniam returned to Ithaca and stunned everyone by playing the back half of her senior season and eventually advancing to the Individuals final (for the third time in her four college seasons) before losing, 13-11 in the fourth, to Columbia’s Simmi Chan.
In recognition of the courage that Subramaniam had evinced in coming back the way she did from such a significant injury, as well as the leadership skills she had shown and the level of play she had attained throughout her intercollegiate career, she received the Betty Richey Award, the top honor for a women’s college squash player, which each year is awarded to a women’s senior student-athlete “who best exemplifies the ideals of squash, based on their love of and devotion to the game, strong sense of fairness, excellence in play, leadership, sportsmanship, and their overall contributions to intercollegiate squash.” At her college graduation (with a degree in Communications) that spring, she also was selected as the women’s recipient of Cornell’s Charles H. Moore Senior Athlete of the Year, the first squash player ever to be so honored.
Realizing that, despite her advance to the 2023 Individuals final, she still had a long way to go to return to her full pre-accident level of strength and conditioning, Subramaniam continued her physical therapy sessions and training, much of it (even after her graduation) in Ithaca under Coach Palmer. Seven months after losing to Chan in the 2023 Individuals final, she beat her by a thrilling 8-11, 15-13, 10-12, 11-9, 12-10 tally (after falling behind two games to one and by scores of 8-4 and later 9-7 in the fifth game) in the gold-medal round of the 2023 Asian Games Individual squash championship.
Her 64-minute comeback victory, which occurred 470 days after her horrific automobile accident – and less than a week after she had played No. 1 and led Malaysia to the Asian Games Team gold medal – was a triumph of the human spirit, of a never-give-up attitude, and of a desperate but also defiant “one more point, one more point,” refrain that kept sounding in her head throughout her frenetic fifth game with Chan.
Then, six months later in early April 2024, Subramaniam, who by then had climbed to No. 13 in the world rankings, electrified the squash world when she sequentially defeated Nour El Sherbini, Nele Gilis and Hania El Hammamy (the Nos. 1, 4 and 2 world ranked players respectively) to win the prestigious Gillen Markets London Squash Classic at Alexandra Palace. Her performance elevated her into the PSA top-10 and caused her to be chosen as the World Games Athlete of the Month for April 2024.
Subramaniam is very clear about the degree to which she credits Coach Palmer and her entire college experience at Cornell, both on the court and in the classroom, for “opening my eyes” and molding her as a person. She moved with remarkable grace and efficiency even before arriving at Ithaca, but Palmer made her into a much more aggressive and effective volleyer, added a substantial level of explosiveness to her game, and sharpened her tactically as well. He praises her as a responsible and loyal team member who eagerly participated in every dual meet – going 50-3 overall, always at No. 1, including an undefeated junior 2021-22 slate and a 28-match winning streak over parts of three seasons – and enthusiastically supported all of her teammates.
The fact that – despite graduating from Cornell nearly two years ago – Siva Subramaniam continues to regard Palmer as a primary coach and to train with him in Ithaca whenever she is in the States speaks volumes about the coach/player relationship that they have developed, and it is yet another sign of the staying power of the college squash experience and the ongoing positive influence it has on some of squash’s brightest stars.
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Rob Dinerman has written 18 books about squash, five of which are Histories of the sport at various top-tier colleges, including A Century Of Champions: 100 Years Of College Squash, 1923-2023, which was released in March 2024. His most recent book, entitled Racquets & Rivalries: Tales and Profiles from 100 Years of New York City Squash, was released in January 2025.