You are actually making my point. Even a stupid compact car becomes the equivalent of a monster truck when you drop an already low car an extra 3". Potentially, instead of the impacting car meeting the rockers, bumpers or other structural elements, it runs into nothing but sheet metal and destroys a vehicle that might have otherwise been repairable.
Now that might not have been the case here, but sitting low damn sure didn't help. We could debate if the roof would have seen as much damage if the car was at normal height.
It's a mean world out there and if you're going to mix it up in modern traffic full of SUVs, CUVs and compacts that sit higher than ever, it's kinda dumb to make your old car more vulnerable.