The many talents of Kiyomi McMiller
Just 10 games into her college career, the Rutgers freshman has used her diverse skillset to cement herself as a budding superstar.
PISCATAWAY – When Sue Bird is comparing you favorably to Caitlin Clark, you’re probably doing something right.
After Rutgers five-star freshman Kiyomi McMiller put up 25 points, 11 rebounds and six assists against Georgia Southern on Nov. 30, Bird gave her a shoutout on “A Touch More,” her podcast with Megan Rapinoe.
“It was her deep three that was kinda exciting,” Bird said. “She was throwing them up there from the deep. And you know, is that the Caitlin Clark effect we used to call the Steph Curry effect? So I’m keeping my eye on her.”
It was a reference to players who want to take after Curry, and now Clark, and become 3-point specialists who can bury shots from seemingly anywhere. And McMiller has the goods. On Wednesday against FDU, two of her three 3-pointers came from NBA distance.
But far more than shooting goes into a final stat line of 30 points, 11 rebounds, five assists and three steals.
Just 10 games into her college career, McMiller has cemented herself as a budding superstar, with a skillset that makes her fun to watch for her social media followers and her coaches alike.
As Rutgers head coach Coquese Washington put it in the preseason, “Just make sure when you go get your popcorn, you do it at the right time, because you don’t want to miss something.”
Offense
The start of this Rutgers season belonged to forward Destiny Adams, who was among the nation’s leaders in both scoring and rebounding after the first handful of games. McMiller, meanwhile, had her college debut interrupted when she was poked in the eye four minutes into the opener and had to sit the rest of the day.
Her shot wasn’t falling in her second game, but since then she’s logged at least 14 points in eight straight, going for 20 six times.
McMiller’s handles were the focus of her mixtapes coming out of high school, but dribbling has to come in service of creating offense. When basketball scouts say a player can create for herself and for others, McMiller is the prototype of what that looks like. She gets her own shots, especially deep, and she makes good passes in transition.
My favorite highlight from Wednesday was this no-look, backwards pass to set up Mya Petticord for a three. Calling this pass “casual” wouldn’t do it justice:
“I just always know where my teammates are. Just because of what I do in practice, they kind of are expecting it more,” McMiller said postgame. “Now it’s like, ‘If I drive this way, if I come behind Kiyomi, she’s most likely gonna give me the ball right here.’ And Mya knows that the most, she does it the most. She’s always in the right spots. I’m like, ‘She’s gonna knock it down, give it to her.’”
Rutgers held a 15-point lead at halftime, but it didn’t take long for the Scarlet Knights to push that into the 20s. They began the third quarter on a 9-2 run, and although McMiller didn’t score, the 5-foot-8 point guard grabbed four defensive rebounds in the first 2:20 of the period and immediately got her team moving up court, something Washington appreciated.
“One of the things Kiyomi does is she helps with our pace,” Washington said. “When she’s rebounding and pushing the pace and we’re getting out in transition, we’re really tough to stop. … That transferred into our halfcourt offense, where we were attacking, moving the ball from side to side, finding each other and able to get the kind of shots we want to get out of the offense.”
With McMiller and Adams both averaging 19-plus points per game, it’s fair to say the Scarlet Knights’ offense is a two-woman show, at its best when the guard and the wing are hitting their spots and making plays.
BartTorvik.com tracks advanced stats for women’s college basketball as well as men’s. It shows Adams and McMiller both rank top-40 nationally in usage rate, which calculates the percentage of a team’s possessions a particular player is involved in when she’s on the floor. No other set of teammates ranks that highly. They also rank second and fifth in usage rate in the Big Ten, and McMiller has the highest usage rate (31.7) of any power-conference freshman.
“I think when we both get going, I don’t think nobody can stop us,” McMiller said. “I don’t really care what nobody says. I believe it. You just gotta prove it wrong at that point.”
Defense
McMiller has shown good defensive instincts for a freshman as well, and not just against an overmatched opponent like FDU.
When the Scarlet Knights trailed Wisconsin by 11 through three quarters of their Big Ten opener, McMiller was a key sparkplug in their comeback to take a brief lead. And it started when she helped onto a driving Wisconsin big, made a textbook steal and took it the other way for a quick two.
Rutgers wound up rallying for a three-point lead late in that game before falling 66-64, but there’s some promise that the Scarlet Knights will better hold their own in the league this year.
McMiller’s primary assignment Wednesday was FDU lead guard Ava Renninger, the Knights’ top scorer at 14.6 ppg coming in. Renninger finished 3-for-14 from the field with five turnovers.
“Kiyomi is a really, really good defender, especially on the ball,” Washington said.
“She’s got quick hands, quick feet, so she can keep people in front of her, she can put pressure on the ball and make people make mistakes. And I think we got a couple turnovers with her being able to do that. Force their point guard, force their lead guard to make some mistakes, and then we were able to capitalize on that. And that’s definitely a luxury to have out there is when you can make their primary ballhandlers make mistakes, make their primary ballhandlers get uncomfortable because of the pressure. And that leads to turnovers and opportunities for us to go down and quick strike.”
FDU had drawn within 12 points early in the fourth quarter, but McMiller took some wind out of those sails when she anticipated this backcourt pass, showcasing her agility to jump in for a scoop and score.
“Honestly, I just read them, because for the most part players have tendencies,” McMiller said. “So throughout the game they show their tendencies, or watching film, you see the same things they do over and over again. You pretty much just wait for what they’re about to do.”
What comes next
The current weaknesses in McMiller’s game aren’t a mystery.
Though she put up a career-high 30 points Wednesday, it took her 30 shots to get there. After it appeared she had subbed out for the rest of the game at the 1:30 mark of the fourth, Rutgers put McMiller back in with 41 seconds left needing two more points to reach 30. She had a jumper roll in and out before she made a driving layup in the final second to complete the feat.
Her shooting efficiency has wavered from game to game, though she’s usually producing at a good clip from 3-point range. She is liable to take some heat checks from behind the arc, and when I watched her against Princeton back in November (12-for-25 from the field) and against FDU (12-for-30), she would often rush into the first potential shot she saw, early in the shot clock, with no teammates ready to rebound an eventual miss.
Few 18-year-old point guards are going to be polished decision-makers. That self-discipline, for lack of a better word, comes as a player gains experience and knowledge. The good news is McMiller isn’t a hasty passer – her turnover rate (16.5) is surprisingly moderate for someone as high-usage as she is. Though McMiller committed several turnovers early in November, she had just two Wednesday and only one against Wisconsin, which bodes well for the jump in competition coming up in Big Ten play.
It also indicates she’s gotten increasingly familiar with her teammates, and her teammates with her.
“I think we’re definitely starting to understand each other more, and I think that’s going to play a really big part when it comes to Big Ten play,” McMiller said. “It’s something that I really look forward to.”
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Hi there, hello. I hope you enjoyed reading about the multitalented McMiller as much as I enjoyed breaking down her game. Will all this translate to wins in the Big Ten? The Scarlet Knights went 2-16 in conference play last year; I feel comfortable predicting they’ll at least double that win total, even though the league is tougher with the additions of UCLA and USC and there are eight top-25 teams on the schedule.
Time to clean the glass with other news and notes from around the sport:
Washington did not have an update after starting guard Lisa Thompson appeared to badly injury her right knee during the third quarter. Thompson had to be carried off the court by team trainers.
At Jadwin Gym, the Princeton women defeated Rhode Island 66-54, getting a measure of revenge after losing to the Rams on the road last season. Ashley Chea led the way with 18 points and six assists, but the story to me was backup center Tabitha Amanze having another career performance. In just 14 minutes, she poured in 14 points on 7-of-9 shooting, adding two steals and two blocks. Her contributions are going to be crucial in Ivy League play for Princeton, which was coming off an 0-2 road trip to Portland and Utah.
Villanova defeated FDU 86-72, but the Knights stayed in the game at Finneran Pavilion much better than Rider did the other week. Through 19 minutes they were only behind by five; when Villanova stretched the lead to much greater margins in the second half, FDU’s offense kept finding ways to respond. Terrence Brown went for 27 points on an efficient 10-of-18, Jo’el Emanuel scored 14 and 3-point sharpshooter Dylan Jones had 11.