{"id":75338,"date":"2025-07-19T12:21:12","date_gmt":"2025-07-19T12:21:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/75338\/"},"modified":"2025-07-19T12:21:12","modified_gmt":"2025-07-19T12:21:12","slug":"why-olivia-miles-skipped-the-wnba-draft-and-left-notre-dame","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/75338\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Olivia Miles skipped the WNBA draft and left Notre Dame"},"content":{"rendered":"

Olivia Miles might have been playing this weekend along with WNBA rookie Paige Bueckers at the league\u2019s All-Star Game.<\/p>\n

But Miles decided to return to college this year instead of going to the WNBA draft as a projected lottery pick. The former Notre Dame star transferred to TCU<\/a> to try to improve her game, earn some extra NIL money and continue to grow her brand.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it was a mixture of me listening to my body and what I needed and also just another year to develop, you know be in a system where it\u2019ll favor me and I\u2019ll have great teammates and a great coach around me,\u201d Miles told The Associated Press. \u201dI\u2019ll have a lot of fun so I\u2019m just very excited for that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miles missed the 2023-24 season while recovering from an ACL tear she suffered in the regular-season finale the year before to end her sophomore campaign. She became the first men\u2019s or women\u2019s freshman to post a triple-double in the NCAA Tournament in 2022, and was putting the final touches on a season that had made her an Associated Press second-team All-American when she crashed to the baseline after her right knee buckled on a drive at Louisville in 2023.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just felt like I had a lot more left in me in the tank,\u201d she said. \u201cBeing far, far removed from my injury, mentally, physically, emotionally, was what I was telling myself, so, it was a lot of back and forth.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miles said she literally waited until the last minute to decide what she wanted to do, something she\u2019d love to see the WNBA change in the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cI didn\u2019t decide until the very end, as you know, we have 48 hours to make a huge life decision, which is really hard,\u201d Miles said.<\/p>\n

One thing she\u2019s happy about when she does enter the WNBA next season: There will be a new collective bargaining agreement that should include an increase in player salaries. Right now the rookie salary is about $75,000 for top picks. She\u2019ll make a lot more than that this year in college. The low salaries were one factor in Miles\u2019 decision, but she said it wasn\u2019t a major one.<\/p>\n

Then when she decided to stay in school, Miles made another big choice to enter the transfer portal and leave Notre Dame<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI knew it was going to be a big story,\u201d she said. \u201cI knew it was going to (upset) a lot of people. I knew it was going to cause a lot of commotion, but I ultimately was selfish one time with my career. I was talking to a bunch of power schools and then ultimately I really just wanted to go somewhere where I\u2019d be able to showcase my abilities the best that I can.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"NotreNotre Dame coach Niele Ivey, right, speaks with guard Olivia Miles during the fourth quarter against TCU in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament at Legacy Arena in Birmingham, Ala., on March 29, 2025. (Eileen T. Meslar\/Chicago Tribune)<\/p>\n

Miles didn\u2019t get into specifics on why she decided to leave Notre Dame but did say it was hard to tell coach Niele Ivey she was leaving.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was her first recruit so there was always a special kind of connection there, so when you have to have a hard conversation about people you care about, it\u2019s tough, but it had to be done,\u201d Miles said. \u201cI didn\u2019t want her to find out, apart from me, so I had to grow up in that moment we had the conversation and we kept it going.\u201d<\/p>\n

Miles said Ivey reassured her that she would \u201calways be a part of the family and that she loves me. I\u2019m doing what\u2019s best for me, she\u2019s doing what\u2019s best for her so there\u2019s always respect there from my end.\u201d<\/p>\n

She said she liked a lot of what TCU has done the last few years under coach Mark Campbell.<\/p>\n

\u201cI won\u2019t be restricted anywhere, I\u2019ll be able to kind of flow and have fun and really showcase before I get to the league,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Olivia Miles might have been playing this weekend along with WNBA rookie Paige Bueckers at the league\u2019s All-Star…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":75339,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[52426,52425,19414,45328,62,10077,67,132,68,232,21829],"class_list":{"0":"post-75338","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-wnba","8":"tag-ncaa-transfer-portal","9":"tag-nielle-ivey","10":"tag-notre-dame","11":"tag-olivia-miles","12":"tag-sports","13":"tag-tcu","14":"tag-united-states","15":"tag-unitedstates","16":"tag-us","17":"tag-wnba","18":"tag-wnba-draft"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114879875309162996","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75338","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75338\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}