Kerrigan Miller: 50-50 hustle and heart

While All-American senior midfielder Kerrigan Miller was interviewed after a morning practice at McAlister Field, her teammates lined up on the bench patiently waiting for her to finish up and join them. A loud thud rebounded off a wall, and Miller swiveled. 

Her teammate, senior midfielder Kaeli Huff, who has played alongside Miller since the fourth grade, was nursing her eye from the impact of a ricocheted shot. Only after inspecting the injury and ensuring Huff’s welfare did Miller tentatively return to answer more questions.

It was clear that the Bayport, N.Y. native was not only a remarkable player on the field but a loved one off of it.

“She does have such a balance,” head coach Lindsey Munday said. “She’s a monster and she’s a beast, and she steps off [the field] and she’s super loving and caring and sweet.”

Now, leaning against her stick while keeping a side-eyed view on Huff, Miller turned her forearm outward to reveal the words “love you like crazy” inked beneath the crook of her left elbow. She told US Lacrosse Magazine that the tattoo is an homage to her family, in which the phrase has developed into a motto. It was thanks to her two older sisters, MacKenzie and Delaney, that Miller started playing lacrosse in the first place.

“[I] did everything they did,” Kerrigan said.

When a youth program arrived in their town, Kerrigan played on her sisters’ teams until she was able to join a team in her own age range. 

Years later, Miller’s younger sister, Maddigan, is committed to play lacrosse at Stanford next fall. Although Kerrigan is disappointed she neither gets to play against nor with her sister, she’s happy Maddigan is paving her own way.

“I really respect [my sister’s] decision to create her own path,” Miller said. “Hopefully, I’ll still be out here [next year] so we’ll be together, but I’m just super proud of her.”

Miller’s legacy on the West Coast is something to be both admired and feared. There’s a reason Just Women’s Sports predicted that upon her exit from college athletics, Miller will be remembered as one of the best West Coast lacrosse players of all time. 

The two-time Pac-12 Midfielder of the Year and last year’s Pac-12 Tournament Most Valuable Player was ILWomen’s No. 1-ranked recruit when she committed to USC in 2016. With her pick from a number of perennial powerhouse programs, including Maryland, North Carolina and Northwestern, Miller decided instead to spearhead the success of a newer program — USC — which was only in its fourth year as a Division I team. 

“I could’ve gone to a [more established program], but I kind of wanted to be a part of something more,” Miller said in a 2016 interview with Inside Lacrosse. “I thought there was that kind of opportunity for me at USC. The coaching staff was what I was so confident in, and I knew they could take a player and a group of girls and make them into the highest caliber of lacrosse players there are.” 

Four years and a Pac-12 Championship later, Miller had called it from the beginning. 

“[USC] has literally changed my life completely,” Miller said. “I’m so happy after four years that I came out here, despite it being so far away from home and it being a new program. It was one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. Each year I can feel myself growing from a player standpoint and as a person.”

One of Miller’s greatest points of growth as a player was learning to channel her intense emotions on the field. Her athletic prowess always shines brightest between the 30-yard lines, where the 5-foot-5 Miller is known for her ability to steal the ball out of competitors’ sticks and take it coast-to-coast. 

During the 2018 and 2019 seasons, Miller led the Pac-12 with 40 and 41 caused turnovers, respectively. While Munday says that these 50-50 hustle and heart plays define her as an athlete, her fervor has sometimes hindered her performance in the past.

“[It’s] her biggest strength, but also sometimes it holds you back because you’re so passionate and you’re so committed and you’re so emotionally invested,” Munday said. “So I think her managing her emotions and really channeling them, she’s really grown in that area. And I think I’ve seen it already this season where she’s made changes in-game when she’s kind of been emotional and she’s gotten out of that, and just focuses on the things that she can control.”

Her teammate Huff, now with a black ring around her left eye, said Miller’s passion is contagious.

“She just creates this team dynamic,” Huff said. “She talks to everybody right before practice and pumps everybody up. She definitely has projected her competitive spirit onto everyone else, and that’s helped us”.

Miller recently became the fifth Trojan to reach the 100-goal milestone during USC’s win over Michigan and was previosly added to the 2020 Tewaaraton Award Watch List, but she remains steadfastly team-oriented. 

“This program wants a national championship,” Miller said, smiling. “We have no problem saying that. That’s what we want to do.”

Under Kerrigan’s leadership and an attitude that balances both might and humility, the goal is certainly feasible. 

50-50 hustle and heart — that’s Kerrigan Miller in a nutshell.