USMMA senior Matt Miller sinks two free throws to sink rival Coast Guard; Miller leads all scorers with 20 points

Augusta's Matt Miller was recognized before the game for scoring more than 1000 points at USMMA.

In Monday's interview with USMMA senior and Augusta native Matt Miller, the lefty mentioned how nice it would be to get his third win in four seasons at Kings Point Wednesday against the school's biggest rival, the Coast Guard, in front of his school's rowdy fans. He also mentioned his game winning basket the last time the teams met in Kings Point during Miller's sophomore season.

Well right on cue, Miller scored a game high 20 points and delivered two clutch free throws to give the Mariners a one point lead with 13 seconds remaining before Robbie Kennedy made two more free throws to give USMMA the 50-47 win as the fans rushed the court in excitement:





This report from USMMA's athletic department, from which the pictures in this post are taken, has more details.

One more observation about Miller and his big week, season, and "basketball decade," which I've been lucky to witness at close range:

During that Monday interview, I mentioned to Matt how he was one of my two favorite college players. The other, Augusta University's Keshun Sherrill, was featured last night at AugBball. I noted how Sherrill does "once-in-a-career" things (for most good or even great players) on the court seemingly over and over.

Well I gladly add Matt to my shortest of list of special players. If somebody wrote a script where a player were to make the game winning shot against his school's biggest rival in both home games during a four year series, that script would be thrown out for being too unrealistic. Here is the "throwback Thursday" video from Matt's game winner of two seasons ago, when Matt was still finding his way as a young collegiate player: