Watching Averett University volleyball head coach Danny Miller and his daughter, Averett freshman setter McKenzie on the court at the same time, the adage “a chip off the old block” comes to mind.
Whether it’s Danny yelling instructions to his team from the sidelines, sometimes with a blood-red face, or McKenzie hammering home service aces, both show the same tenacity, intensity and competitiveness that have made Danny one of the most successful coaches in NCAA Division III women’s volleyball and McKenzie a rising star at Averett.
And their similarities can be seen off the hardwood as well.
When I walked into Danny’s office for this interview, he and McKenzie were having a spirited father-daughter conversation. The two went back-and-forth for a minute, their competitiveness on display, before looking over at me and smiling.
None of it surprises Danny, though.
“You can’t grow up around with me out getting a piece of me,” Danny said, laughing. “She’s intense. Doesn’t like to lose and doesn’t hide her emotions well. These are all things I do. People don’t struggle to look at my face and tell whether I’m upset or not.”
And their similarities have given McKenzie almost a sixth sense into her dad’s emotions.
“When I make a mistake, I can look over at him and realize what I did wrong,” McKenzie said. “I guess it’s where he coached me for so long during travel ball, but I know what he’s going to say before he says it. I look over at him and just grin.”
When I was in junior high school, the principal assigned me to my mom’s Spanish class. Knowing it would end in disaster — our personalities are too similar — she withdrew me from the class.
Given the similarities Danny and McKenzie share, it’d be easy to assume they would have trouble working in tight spaces. However, it’s been just the opposite.
Their solution to making it work?
“We have a good relationship in the fact we keep our volleyball and private lives separate,” McKenzie said. “When I’m playing, I’m his player, not his kid. And when we’re off the court, we don’t talk about volleyball so we don’t argue about it.”
In fact, the transition has been so smooth, Danny has only noticed one difference.
“I hug McKenzie more than I would my average player because it would be weird for me to hug the rest of the team,” Danny said, laughing. “Other than that, there’s not really a big difference. I teach McKenzie the same things at home that I teach her and the rest of the team on the court.”
And one of those things is punctuality. In fact, Danny’s become a bit famous for it. When talking with former and current players, the term “Miller Time” gets thrown around quite a bit. In short, Danny’s philosophy is unless you arrive at the correct time according to his watch, you’re late.
“That’s exactly the same,” McKenzie said. “You can’t be late. And if you are, then there are going to be some consequences unless you have a really good reason.”
After McKenzie decided to come to Averett, Danny and McKenzie’s mother, Ruth, knew things weren’t going to be easy, that there were going to be a few drawbacks.
There was the difficulty of maintaining a loving father-daughter relationship simultaneously with a demanding coach-player relationship. There was the chance of fans saying things no father wants to hear his daughter called and the chance of fans hurling accusations of nepotism.
However, McKenzie already had the inside track.
“My mom warned me from the beginning about how things might be,” McKenzie said. “She had experience from being a coach’s wife and told me how things might be. I noticed a few things at first but it eased up once I started playing well and earning my spot on the team.”
And that’s what McKenzie did. She finished second on the team in assists (583), fourth on the squad in service aces (51) and recorded 207 digs while appearing in all 36 of the Cougars’ matches. In addition, she was also named the USA South Conference Rookie of the Week on Sept. 4.
“I think that’s the hardest part,” Danny said, “is knowing that no matter how she’s performing, whether she’s doing well or not, there will always be people who say it’s because she’s the coach’s daughter.”
“There’s always the outside chance a small periphery of people will say, ‘she’s only playing because she’s the coach’s kid,’ or ‘if any other player was playing like that, she’d be pulled.’ We had that conversation, though, and I told her she would be held to higher standards and expectations than others.”
There’s a glass case that sits on Danny’s office desk. In that case, sits nearly two dozen regular season and conference tournament championship rings Danny has won in 23 seasons at Averett, and it’s only a sample of his work.
Since taking over Averett’s reins, Miller has led the Cougars to a 589–274 record and four NCAA Tournament appearances. He has also won seven conference tournament titles and 12 regular season crowns, including the 2016, 2017 USA South Conference East Division championships.
Danny has set the standard in the USA South with his teams posting wins in over 60 percent of their contests. His 589 career wins also rank him in the top-40 among active Division III coaches.
In conference play, Danny’s resume is untouchable. He holds a 293–51 record against USA South opponents and has won more than 84 percent of league games, and the Cougars currently hold a 41-game winning streak in conference play.
On April 20, 2010, Danny became the ninth person inducted into the Cougar Club Sports Hall of Fame. In June 2017, he was inducted into the USA South Conference Hall of Fame. Rounding out his resume, Danny has been named the USA South Conference Coach of the Year eight times as well as the Virginia State Coach of the Year five times.
And her father’s success hasn’t been lost on McKenzie.
“There have definitely been times where I haven’t wanted to listen to him because I knew he was right,” McKenzie said, laughing. “But I know how good of a coach he is so I listen to him because I want to be a better player and person and he’s proven he knows how to do that.”
Not a bad answer for an 18-year-old.
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