Sho kano had everything: Heart, Body and Technique, nonetheless, he was still defeated by Kenichi. Strength doesn't equal power. Boris gave us some further insight into why this is the case. He basically said the advantage between somewhat comparable fighters, is dependent on the situation. He also said the difference in strength will never remain the same and that role of a good disciple is to improve. I was unsure of all the implications of this at first, but after thinking about it makes sense.
Hermit used to be 6th fist in Ragnarok, but became able to take on the 2nd fist Berserker. Berserker's lack of stubbornness for victory and lack of resolve played a role in his defeat. Seikuken used to be nearly unbeatable to fledgling disciples, but eventually it and Ryuto were able to be countered in multiple ways. Seikuken, overpowering the seikuken and speed all can counter Seikuken. Speedy fighters like Miu and Sho Kano were nearly invincible to disciples, but later on high speed could be countered by Rittou No Kan and techniques like Ryuusui Seikuken. Ryuusui Seikuken appeared almost flawless, but later it was found that it could be countered by disrupting your own breathing, having a stronger heart and gamaku (through having kenichi read the wrong signs).
Depending on the match ups, the situation can change, even against those who are far stronger than a fighter in certain domains of combat. Fighters can have astonishing growth spurts, due to specific new training methods and techniques, causing them to grow enough to match those that used to be much stronger than them in certain areas, Kenichi is a prime example of this. Kenichi was a good deal weaker than Ryuto, but through the Seikuken training he became a match for him. Kenichi was much weaker than Sho Kano, but through the Ryuusui Seikuken training, he became strong enough to beat him.
Sho's greatest strengths are his speed and his explosive power. He was able to take out Shinpaku alliance almost in an instant, due to these strengths. However, it's not as if Freya and Takeda weren't able to mount a defense. Freya was able to react to Sho, but he broke her Bo, anyway. Takeda was also able to react to Sho too. They couldn't react perfectly, but they could react to him, barely. As for his explosive power, that can be dealt with by conditioning and ki. Conditioning the bones can help with defense like in the case of Karate and Muay Thai. Ki can harden the body, the higher the ki the better the durability, Apachi basically said fights become contests of ki.
Sho other main strength is his ability to use multiple styles. With multiple styles he's versatile, but that can be a weakness as well as a strength. His attention and training time is divided between 10 styles. Knowing many different styles doesn't necessarily mean there's great depth in skill, in fact quite often it means the opposite. He's more like a jack of all trades master of none (get it...he's not a master, lol. I know, corny joke).
While not all disciples could handle Sho Kano, there's at least a few that possibly could have contended with him, if not at the time he was alive than in the future. There's the obvious cases like Miu, Rimi and Kajima. However there's also the not so obvious cases like Renka, Takeda, Hermit, Berserker and Ryuto. All 5 of them are able good at following and reading opponents. Renka read a master classes moments when she saw Apachi fight against another master and Takeda has Ryuusui Seikuken. Hermit, Berserker and Ryuto were able to keep up with a master's movements in a 3 vs 1 battle.
Most of Yomi IMO, have the potential to close the gap with Sho Kano, even if he stayed alive and continued to grow. All they had to do was hit a specific stage in their development. By learning Rittou No Kan, building up their durability through conditioning and ki, they can mitigate the effectiveness of Sho's main strengths. This was an likely eventuality for many of the current disciple class fighters