‘It’s a show:’ Meet Kiyomi McMiller, a top 2024 recruit with lofty goals

Anyone who gets the chance to get into a gym when Kiyomi McMiller is on the court can expect to be entertained.

“It’s a show, that’s how I take basketball as, a show, and people are coming to watch you,” said the Life Center Academy point guard. “If you go to watch a movie, you don’t want the movie to be boring. You want to be entertained, so that’s how I take basketball. It’s a show; people are coming to watch to be entertained.”

McMiller, who is ranked sixth nationally in ESPN’s rankings for the class of 2024, is in her first season at the school in Burlington. This doesn’t mean she hadn’t already made a name for herself.

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Originally from Maryland, McMiller was born into a basketball family. Her parents, Mike and Ravilia, were coaching at Montgomery College when Kiyomi started showing interest in the game at a young age.

“In the middle of games, she would come out of the stands, tap me on my back or whatever, and ask us when can she get in the game,” Mike McMiller said. “She showed an interest, even while she was in our practices, you’ll see her mimicking what the players were doing or while we were coaching she would run on the floor, ask different questions.”

With an interest in the game and coaches for parents, McMiller started training. These sessions with her parents, who coached at the Maryland college from 2007-09, allowed for McMiller to do more than just improve her game during those hours in the gym. It allowed her to get creative.

“I talk a lot about creativity and I get that from [her father] and my grandmother, his mom,” McMiller said. “So in the gym, that’s a lot of moments I can talk about with that, just being in the gym together, creating different moves. If he sees something, he’ll be like, ‘Do that again,’ and we’ll add stuff to it and just create different things.”

This style of play has put Kiyomi’s game on the map, as her ability to make highlight-worthy moves has made her a social-media sensation.

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McMiller caught the interest of Mike Teasley, the brother of former WNBA player Nikki Teasley. In fact, the Teasleys were family friends of the McMillers, with Mike McMiller coaching in Nikki’s organization at one point.

So when Mike Teasley became the assistant athletic director of Trinity Collegiate School in Florence, S.C., he knew exactly who should be on its girls’ basketball team.

McMiller stood out in a game against South Carolina power Cardinal Newman, which at the time had current Gamecocks freshman Ashlyn Watkins. Although Watkins was the the star of the better-known school, it was McMiller who had the standout performance.

“Kiyomi had 35 that game,” Mike McMiller said. “There were several shots that [Watkins] was coming out at her … and she shot over her and made a couple shots over her. She went into the lane, Ashlyn stepped up, and Kiyomi put on a move that she’s known for, and [Watkins] falls down and Kiyomi hits a shot over her again in the lane.”

At the start of this season, Kiyomi and her father, as an assistant coach, joined the Life Center Academy girls’ basketball team. As part of the Penn-Jersey Athletic Association, Life Center Academy plays schools beyond the state line and in tournaments with top teams nationally.

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While she might be in the Philly area now, her basketball style is strongly influenced by the D.C., Maryland, and Virginia (DMV) area, since it’s where she grew up playing and where her parents coached.

“Kiyomi is a reactionary player, so she sees things, she processes it, but she sees and processes a lot faster than most players,” Mike McMiller said. “She’s [also] putting on a show, but the show is not to showboat, like people like to say. Everybody has a different style; that’s just her style of play … a DMV style of play.”

Still, McMiller came into a new area that, in her eyes, has a different playing style than the “DMV” way she plays the game. She views this as an advantage, though.

“There is no real adjustment I have to make,” she said. “Maybe others have to make adjustments for me, but I don’t have to adjust to anything.”

The way McMiller plays the game and her talent have gotten her to where she is now. She is one of the highest-ranked players in her class and has more than 40 college offers already, a list she plans to narrow down to 25 soon. For her, though, it won’t be enough until she is known for two things.

“The greatest of all time, that’s really it,” she said. “Like when they think of me, I want them to be inspired to be creative and be their own player; just think outside the box.”