Four years ago this month, Iga Swiatek was just about to turn 17 years old when she came to Charleston, S.C., to play in an $80K ITF tournament.
She looked much like other teenagers on the pro tennis tour. But you could tell that this 5-9 girl from Warsaw was more athletic than most of the other players. She hadn’t shaped her game yet as she played all over the court, defeating many of her opponents because of her athletic ability.
RANKED ONLY 412TH IN THE WORLD FOUR YEARS AGO
Swiatek was ranked only 412th in the world that May of 2018. She moved through qualifying all the way to the semifinals, winning six straight matches in the Charleston event.
She was athletic, but otherwise she didn’t look like someone with a high-level tennis game. She had many rough edges in her game.
The next time I saw her play was two years later. As I watched her on the tennis telecasts late in that unique fall French Open of 2020, I was shocked at her newly constructed tennis game. She wasn’t all over the court. She had a game plan.
She might have been mistaken for a Chris Evert or Tracy Austin of another era. This Swiatek made few errors. Her game was smooth as silk. She just hit the ball much harder than Evert and Austin.
MARCHING LIKE CLOCKWORK IN PARIS
Swiatek was like clockwork in marching through that French Open as a 19-year-old. It was her first career WTA singles title.
She didn’t make any other spectacular moves up the tennis ladder until 2022.
She was totally prepared to take over the world’s No. 1 ranking when Ashleigh Barty retired early this year.
And, wow, Swiatek has made everyone in tennis sit up and take notice of her game and accomplishments.
IGA’S PICTURE-BOOK TENNIS GAME
Swiatek plays a game of picture-book tennis, seldom having to over-exert herself in matches. Her game is a thing of art.
She smoothly blasts balls to every corner of the court with sheer perfection and power, never looking out of sync. She’s not a big hitter the likes of Serena Williams or Steffi Graf.
Swiatek just rips bullets all over the court with relative ease without appearing to be powerful.
She smothers her opposition with perfection.
With her stylish tennis attire, she looks thinner than a 152-pound player. She is a sensational mover. Opponents might as well keep their drop shots in their bag. Just ask the almost humiliated Ons Jabeur, the owner of one of the best drop shots in tennis but who was unable to execute winning points on drop shots in last week’s Rome final against Swiatek.
NOVAK AND RAFA SHOULD COPY SWIATEK
Novak Djokovic and Rafa Nadal could take some tips from Swiatek, who appears to be just as quick on the court as either of those two giants of men’s tennis. But she tops both of them with the way she makes her lightning-like move toward the net and then almost flawlessly connects her heavy top-spins with the ball and lifts it over the net with a flash of brilliance and power.
Dropping only five sets while winning her last 28 matches is a remarkable feat. In those 23 straight-set wins among her 28-match winning streak, she yielded a total of only 95 games. That’s an average of just over four games per match won by those opponents.
And, of course, Swiatek now looks like the heavy favorite to win her second French Open title.
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James Beck was the 2003 winner of the USTA National Media Award as the tennis columnist for the Charleston (S.C.) Post and Courier newspapers. A 1995 MBA graduate of The Citadel, he can be reached at Jamesbecktennis@gmail.com.
