- Joined
- May 8, 2002
- Posts
- 1,263,557
- Reaction score
- 59
CHICAGO — Consider the promise kept.
Former Notre Dame women’s basketball All-American point guard Olivia Miles owed nobody nothing when she decided in March 2025 to take her college career in a different direction.
No explanation. No excuse. Absolutely no apology.
After four and a half years, two All-American honors, two degrees and plenty of plays that forced fans from their seats during those can-you-believe-that sequences, Miles needed a change. For her game. For her future.
After 101 games, 3,241 minutes, 605 rebounds, 654 assists, 1,430 points, 25 double doubles and six triple doubles at Notre Dame, Miles did what thousands of players in college basketball do at season’s end.
She jumped into the transfer portal.
Noie: This is how Notre Dame basketball moves forward from its awful April
Noie: Notre Dame football ends spring practice, and we have a few thoughts
Maybe it was the way she left, on the heels of a Sweet 16 loss to the same program that she wound up joining — TCU. Maybe a Notre Dame season that went so far off the rails — the Irish spent a long stretch of 2024-25 ranked No. 1 — sought a scapegoat. It needed someone to bear the weight of the frustration for that flameout.
Hating on Miles became convenient. She was the lightning rod for a storm of frustration. Anger, even. In terms of messy Notre Dame exits, it was Brian Kelly and Miles at 1 and 1A. Like, how dare they leave?
It wasn't that Miles went off to play her final season elsewhere. It was as if she had emptied out the program’s trophy case into the back of her car, then swiped one of the two national championship banners that hang in Purcell Pavilion.
Miles leaving left a mark.
“I pissed a lot of people off,” Miles told the Tribune in an exclusive interview on the morning of Saturday, May 23 before the sixth game of a professional career that has her doing stuff for the Minnesota Lynx as the No. 2 pick of the 2026 WNBA draft (15.0 ppg., 5.0 rpg., 5.5 apg., 30.3 mpg.) that few have done. “It was a hard transition. I was (at Notre Dame) for four and a half years. I think that’s why it was shocking to a lot of people.”
∎∎∎
Shocking to her was the fallout from the departure. It was as if all those magical moments that Miles had offered (she tallied a triple double with 20 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists in her first game in 617 days after a knee injury) meant nothing. That she left a program that few leave bothered many.
That bothered Miles.
In early December 2025, Miles agreed to sit with the Tribune on the TCU campus. She would talk of her new home and her new role and her new beginning in her last year of college. Twenty-four hours before the scheduled meeting, word arrived from TCU that Miles was out.
She wasn’t ready to go down the Notre Dame road. It was too soon. Everything, she told a Tribune reporter in a back hallway of Schollmaier Arena following an overtime victory by the Notre Dame men’s basketball program over TCU, “was still too raw.”
A deal was made. Wherever Miles ended up going in the April WNBA draft, she and the Tribune would reconnect on her first visit to Wintrust Arena, home to the Chicago Sky and barely 80 minutes from the Notre Dame campus.
I got you, Miles told the Tribune in early December. A fist bump sealed the deal. In late May, the WNBA schedule took the Lynx and Miles to Chicago. Two minutes before her scheduled media availability, Miles stepped from the Lynx locker room and opened that door from the past.
Why now and not then?
“I didn’t want to talk (because) I knew the fan base was still holding onto it,” the 23-year-old Miles said. “It took me a minute to adjust. I don’t know why people were upset.”
To many not versed in today’s transient/transactional world of college basketball, it was baffling why Miles would leave the only college program she’d known for the unknown. She played a lot at Notre Dame. She put up numbers at Notre Dame. She won at Notre Dame.
Why leave? Why not?
“To me, it made sense,” Miles said. “I was like, I already did everything I could do there and more. I feel like I had my time there. I was able to reflect on it. It happened. I’m glad it happened.
“I’m grateful for my experience, but I needed something new and I needed a change of scenery.”
∎∎∎
Miles found it 1,500 miles from her Phillipsburg, New Jersey home in Fort Worth, Texas. She became someone she couldn’t be at Notre Dame, definitely not while sharing the backcourt and the basketball with fellow standout guard Hannah Hidalgo. She discovered what it was like to run a team on her own, to be the one to make all the right reads on every single possession.
How there were no nights off. How she would have to produce in one game, then produce more the next. In some ways, leaving Notre Dame and playing at TCU allowed Miles to learn how to be a pro.
That may sting some in South Bend, but it’s true. She went to places at TCU as a player that she wasn't going to go at Notre Dame.
“I was able to get a lot of reps that I didn’t get at Notre Dame,” Miles said. “Notre Dame was more of a system offense. It was different. We had a lot of talent in a lot of different positions and everyone had to eat.
“At TCU, I had to kind of figure it out on my own.”
Miles figured it out. She averaged career highs for points (19.6), free throw percentage (.839) and minutes (35.4). She averaged 7.2 rebounds and 6.6 assists per game. She earned Big 12 Player of the Year.
She scored a career high 40 points in one game, grabbed a career best 16 rebounds in another and tied her career high with 14 assists. She didn’t get to a Final Four, but neither did Notre Dame. She became the No. 2 pick of the WNBA draft.
As her final year wound down, she also found peace in her decision, even if those in Indiana still included a few four-letter words when her name came up. Notre Dame basketball fans stewed that she left but barely cared when Michiana native Markus Burton bolted for Bloomington.
Get over it. Miles has.
“They’re fans; they want you where they’re at,” Miles said. “I can understand it, but ... It means I did something right and it means that it impacted people enough for them to care about where I am and care about the environments that I’m in.
“The community that I was part of at Notre Dame was special. It was hard to leave.”
∎∎∎
It’s odd to see Miles’ WNBA bio and see TCU in the spot for alma mater. It should say Notre Dame.
“Her journey changed and shifted, and TCU was really special to her,” said former Irish shooting guard Kayla McBride, now a Lynx teammate. “She’ll always be a Notre Dame kid to me.”
Chicago is as close as Miles will get to South Bend, so much so that when she’s in the city, she said it feels like she’s back “home.” Miles hasn’t been to Notre Dame since she left for TCU. She might do what so many former Irish in the W do and return for a regular season game one day. Then again ...
“I don’t know if I’m welcome there,” Miles said.
She was joking. Maybe. She should get a standing ovation and video highlight thank you on the day she returns.
She did a lot for Notre Dame. For all the hard feelings over her transfer, Miles holds her time in South Bend close to her heart. The kid who arrived as the first mid-year enrollee in program history in January 2021, grew her game and grew up on that campus.
That’s something she’ll never forget. So, she left. Big deal.
“I’m still a Notre Dame alum whether they want to claim me or not, so they can’t get rid of me that easily,” Miles said. “I truly do love that place.”
Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at [email protected]
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Olivia Miles discusses transfer from Notre Dame women's basketball to TCU
Continue reading...
Former Notre Dame women’s basketball All-American point guard Olivia Miles owed nobody nothing when she decided in March 2025 to take her college career in a different direction.
No explanation. No excuse. Absolutely no apology.
After four and a half years, two All-American honors, two degrees and plenty of plays that forced fans from their seats during those can-you-believe-that sequences, Miles needed a change. For her game. For her future.
After 101 games, 3,241 minutes, 605 rebounds, 654 assists, 1,430 points, 25 double doubles and six triple doubles at Notre Dame, Miles did what thousands of players in college basketball do at season’s end.
She jumped into the transfer portal.
Noie: This is how Notre Dame basketball moves forward from its awful April
Noie: Notre Dame football ends spring practice, and we have a few thoughts
Maybe it was the way she left, on the heels of a Sweet 16 loss to the same program that she wound up joining — TCU. Maybe a Notre Dame season that went so far off the rails — the Irish spent a long stretch of 2024-25 ranked No. 1 — sought a scapegoat. It needed someone to bear the weight of the frustration for that flameout.
Hating on Miles became convenient. She was the lightning rod for a storm of frustration. Anger, even. In terms of messy Notre Dame exits, it was Brian Kelly and Miles at 1 and 1A. Like, how dare they leave?
It wasn't that Miles went off to play her final season elsewhere. It was as if she had emptied out the program’s trophy case into the back of her car, then swiped one of the two national championship banners that hang in Purcell Pavilion.
Miles leaving left a mark.
“I pissed a lot of people off,” Miles told the Tribune in an exclusive interview on the morning of Saturday, May 23 before the sixth game of a professional career that has her doing stuff for the Minnesota Lynx as the No. 2 pick of the 2026 WNBA draft (15.0 ppg., 5.0 rpg., 5.5 apg., 30.3 mpg.) that few have done. “It was a hard transition. I was (at Notre Dame) for four and a half years. I think that’s why it was shocking to a lot of people.”
∎∎∎
Shocking to her was the fallout from the departure. It was as if all those magical moments that Miles had offered (she tallied a triple double with 20 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists in her first game in 617 days after a knee injury) meant nothing. That she left a program that few leave bothered many.
That bothered Miles.
In early December 2025, Miles agreed to sit with the Tribune on the TCU campus. She would talk of her new home and her new role and her new beginning in her last year of college. Twenty-four hours before the scheduled meeting, word arrived from TCU that Miles was out.
She wasn’t ready to go down the Notre Dame road. It was too soon. Everything, she told a Tribune reporter in a back hallway of Schollmaier Arena following an overtime victory by the Notre Dame men’s basketball program over TCU, “was still too raw.”
A deal was made. Wherever Miles ended up going in the April WNBA draft, she and the Tribune would reconnect on her first visit to Wintrust Arena, home to the Chicago Sky and barely 80 minutes from the Notre Dame campus.
I got you, Miles told the Tribune in early December. A fist bump sealed the deal. In late May, the WNBA schedule took the Lynx and Miles to Chicago. Two minutes before her scheduled media availability, Miles stepped from the Lynx locker room and opened that door from the past.
Why now and not then?
“I didn’t want to talk (because) I knew the fan base was still holding onto it,” the 23-year-old Miles said. “It took me a minute to adjust. I don’t know why people were upset.”
To many not versed in today’s transient/transactional world of college basketball, it was baffling why Miles would leave the only college program she’d known for the unknown. She played a lot at Notre Dame. She put up numbers at Notre Dame. She won at Notre Dame.
Why leave? Why not?
“To me, it made sense,” Miles said. “I was like, I already did everything I could do there and more. I feel like I had my time there. I was able to reflect on it. It happened. I’m glad it happened.
“I’m grateful for my experience, but I needed something new and I needed a change of scenery.”
∎∎∎
Miles found it 1,500 miles from her Phillipsburg, New Jersey home in Fort Worth, Texas. She became someone she couldn’t be at Notre Dame, definitely not while sharing the backcourt and the basketball with fellow standout guard Hannah Hidalgo. She discovered what it was like to run a team on her own, to be the one to make all the right reads on every single possession.
How there were no nights off. How she would have to produce in one game, then produce more the next. In some ways, leaving Notre Dame and playing at TCU allowed Miles to learn how to be a pro.
That may sting some in South Bend, but it’s true. She went to places at TCU as a player that she wasn't going to go at Notre Dame.
“I was able to get a lot of reps that I didn’t get at Notre Dame,” Miles said. “Notre Dame was more of a system offense. It was different. We had a lot of talent in a lot of different positions and everyone had to eat.
“At TCU, I had to kind of figure it out on my own.”
Miles figured it out. She averaged career highs for points (19.6), free throw percentage (.839) and minutes (35.4). She averaged 7.2 rebounds and 6.6 assists per game. She earned Big 12 Player of the Year.
She scored a career high 40 points in one game, grabbed a career best 16 rebounds in another and tied her career high with 14 assists. She didn’t get to a Final Four, but neither did Notre Dame. She became the No. 2 pick of the WNBA draft.
As her final year wound down, she also found peace in her decision, even if those in Indiana still included a few four-letter words when her name came up. Notre Dame basketball fans stewed that she left but barely cared when Michiana native Markus Burton bolted for Bloomington.
Get over it. Miles has.
“They’re fans; they want you where they’re at,” Miles said. “I can understand it, but ... It means I did something right and it means that it impacted people enough for them to care about where I am and care about the environments that I’m in.
“The community that I was part of at Notre Dame was special. It was hard to leave.”
∎∎∎
It’s odd to see Miles’ WNBA bio and see TCU in the spot for alma mater. It should say Notre Dame.
“Her journey changed and shifted, and TCU was really special to her,” said former Irish shooting guard Kayla McBride, now a Lynx teammate. “She’ll always be a Notre Dame kid to me.”
Chicago is as close as Miles will get to South Bend, so much so that when she’s in the city, she said it feels like she’s back “home.” Miles hasn’t been to Notre Dame since she left for TCU. She might do what so many former Irish in the W do and return for a regular season game one day. Then again ...
“I don’t know if I’m welcome there,” Miles said.
She was joking. Maybe. She should get a standing ovation and video highlight thank you on the day she returns.
She did a lot for Notre Dame. For all the hard feelings over her transfer, Miles holds her time in South Bend close to her heart. The kid who arrived as the first mid-year enrollee in program history in January 2021, grew her game and grew up on that campus.
That’s something she’ll never forget. So, she left. Big deal.
“I’m still a Notre Dame alum whether they want to claim me or not, so they can’t get rid of me that easily,” Miles said. “I truly do love that place.”
Follow South Bend Tribune and NDInsider columnist Tom Noie on X (formerly Twitter): @tnoieNDI. Contact Noie at [email protected]
This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: Olivia Miles discusses transfer from Notre Dame women's basketball to TCU
Continue reading...
