“My imagination is so far out there already. People couldn't imagine what goes on in my brain.” —Missy Elliott
I. Superfly
Jimmy Naismith’s rules for basketball were first published on January 15, 1892, by Springfield College’s student newspaper, The Triangle. There were 13. They’re on view in the DeBruce Center at the University of Kansas. The header at the top of the first page? Basket Ball.
You don’t need me typing all 13 at you. Some are basic. The ball may be thrown in any direction with one or both hands. Some are weird. If either side makes three consecutive fouls, it shall count a goal for the opponents (consecutive means without the opponents in the mean time making a foul). Some are long. No shouldering, holding, pushing, tripping, or striking in any way the person of an opponent shall be allowed; the first infringement of this rule by any player shall count as a foul, the second shall disqualify him until the next goal is made, or, if there was evident intent to injure the person, for the whole of the game, no substitute allowed. Mainly, though, the rules just sound archaic. The time shall be two 15-minute halves, with five minutes’ rest between. He really didn’t want people “striking at the ball with the fist.” And when the ball went out of bounds, it seems like basically all hell broke loose? When the ball goes out of bounds, it shall be thrown into the field of play by the person first touching it. In case of a dispute, the umpire shall throw it straight into the field. Or say the game ended in a tie? The game may, by agreement of the captains, be continued until another goal is made. Sudden death, baby. Golden goal. Or I suppose it would be more of a golden basket situation.
The word “pass” does not appear once. Jimbo opted for “throw.” But times change. For instance, nowadays, nobody says Olivia Miles is a great thrower. They say she’s a great passer. And anyway, Big Jim was born in the mid-1800s. He’d never seen the kind of ultra-electric entertainment value Miles brings nightly. Naismith sees Miles throw a between-the-legs bounce pass, he’s hitting his knees and assuming he’s in the presence of the divine. His assumption would be correct. This is one of the most uniquely skilled, creative basketball players we’ve seen in a long time, and she has come out the gates on five kinds of fire. Runaway Rookie of the Year, of course, but she’s also currently got the frickin’ second-best MVP odds in the league. If that weren’t enough, she’s one of the main reasons the Minnesota Lynx have a real shot of winning their first title in a decade. A real-deal party maker. She rules. Take it away, Curtis.
II. Smooth
It started with a turnover. With a little under six minutes left in the second quarter of a Lynx-Tempo game back in July, Minnesota’s got the ball up 38-33. Courtney Williams tries to thread a pass from the top of the key to Natasha Howard, who’s flashing at the right block. Problem is, Teonni Key’s wings get in the way and knock the ball loose. Marina Mabrey picks up the pill, takes a couple of dribbles, then gets got. This is when Miles enters the mix. The party’s here.
The Lynx’s primo rook cuts Mabrey off, and the Tempo forward responds by trying to fire one over the top to Julie Allemand. But Miles is working out of the back of the book. She gets tall and gets a deflection, the ball floating to half-court before Howard pulls it down out of the sky and fires it back to Miles. Key tries to do to the rookie what the rookie just did to Mabrey, only Miles is ready for it. She OBJ’s it, then takes us into the cosmos. The moment it hits her hand, she immediately whips it on the move, between her legs, the ball hitting Kayla McBride in perfect stride along the right wing. It’s one of the smoothest passes you could ever hope to see. You could slip and slide on that pass. McBride cashes an above-the-break triple, and the Lynx crowd goes berserk, brought to a roar once more by Miles, their resident seer.
This is one of the most ready-made rookies we’ve ever seen, not just in the WNBA, but in professional basketball as a whole. People don’t come in with this amount of polish, this amount of sauce, this amount of volcanic activity. This is an S-tier conductor with a penchant for thrills, and she’s had the magic for years. Won a gold medal in Chile as a member of the United States U16 women’s team. When she was just a junior in high school, ESPN was already touting her as a two-sport phenom, her soccer skills similarly nasty. Even back then, they were already putting her in the same sentence as Sue Bird, Steve Nash, Diana Taurasi. If you’re a point guard, that’s a high-quality sentence to appear in.
She picked Notre Dame over Stanford and North Carolina. She played three full seasons in South Bend, led the ACC in assists every one of those seasons, and made two All-American teams. Then she raised a bunch of eyebrows when she turned down the WNBA to hit the transfer portal and play another year at TCU. Miles wrecked shop down there, won Big 12 Player of the Year, took the Horned Frogs to the Elite Eight, and added another All-American nod to her cover letter along the way.
III. With Apologies to Antoine Carr …
Here’s a transcript of a film session with Candace Parker and Olivia Miles on April 15, 2025. This takes place shortly after Miles decided to forgo the WNBA draft and transfer to TCU for a fifth year:
Candace Parker: So, can you walk me through how this came about? Because you do this so naturally.
Olivia Miles: So, I was pushing the break. I obviously know where everyone’s running habits should be, so I trusted that Maddy [Westbeld] would be there. But ultimately, the defense has to sprint and turn their back. So, Hailey Van Lith, as you saw, she kind of lost Maddy ’cause she’s sprinting to Hannah [Hidalgo]. You just give her a little look. Like, eyes are everything. I don’t think people really understand …
Parker: Say that again, for the people in the back. You do that amazingly.
Miles: That’s why I fixed my goggles [laughing]. I had to be able to use my eyes.
Parker: You fixed your goggles twice.
Miles: But no, I think, you just give a little head fake or a little eye fake, it forces people to make movements. Manipulate them how you want. You see, Hailey doesn’t even really know what’s going on here, so …
What you have to understand is that the court vision is off the charts. She’s processing the game at crazy levels already. Her imagination is extravagant, full to the gills. She knows the eyes are the best liars we have. Smart of her to keep hers so well protected.
Olivia Miles passes during the game against the Toronto Tempo on July 28
Something else to understand: She wears goggles, and they are the best. They are her trademark, her calling card, her signature. She’s already got a sponsorship with GlassesUSA. I’m not sure why some of the more high-end eyewear brands aren’t knocking her door down. I don’t see why Jacques Marie Mage can’t make her a few pairs with actual turquoise embedded in the frames and little silver lynxes on the earpieces. Shouldn’t be that hard. With apologies to Jazz-era Antoine Carr, Miles is the most dynamic bespectacled hooper since Kareem. The goggles suit her, give her an air of refined omnipotence that she wears nicely.
IV. On the Banks of Kabetogama Lake
She’s more than just a passer, but holy shit, is she a passer. The passing is luxurious and artful. The passing is [opens present]. The passing is everybody dance now. The passing is [Price Is Right voice] A BRAND-NEW CAR. Miles’s repertoire is expressive, exacting, elegant, rowdy. She’s flinging highlights left and right, splitting arrows. You know that kid who performed at his school talent show or whatever and he just walked out there and flipped the water bottle perfectly and the place went nuts? That’s sort of the experience of watching Miles pass the rock at this point. Her assists border on spectacle. They have sparkling personalities. The camera loves them. Some are cheeky, some are thoughtful, some are silly, some are just plain cool. She just dropped a career-high 13 on Azzi Fudd, Paige Bueckers, and the rest of the Dallas Wings last week. She’s got the ball on a string; she’s loaded up with ammo. There are moments when it seems like she can see the future.
A pass is “I got you” in motion, and if you’re with Miles, she’s got you. This past weekend, she ripped Chelsea Gray, then strung a no-look long-distance bounce pass that sneaked between two Aces defenders and hit a teammate in stride for a layup at the other end. And she’s so ho-hum about it all. You don’t watch her operate and think there’s any heavy lifting going on here. She’s got a fluidity and a strength with the ball that reads as effortlessness. You’re not gonna big girl her and knock her off her spot. You’re not gonna speed her up. You’re gonna go at her speed because she said so. She controls the flow. She’s processing the game at such a high level that things are already moving slowly for her. The league will not be imposing its will on her. That’s gonna go the other way around. She’s a unique blend. Sort of a Chelsea Gray meets Brandon Roy meets a more chill Manu Ginobili. It’s playmaking and steadiness and surprises. It’s invention and resourcefulness. Miles got to 500 career points and 150 career assists faster than any other player in WNBA history. She contains multitudes. Pyrotechnic, a Stradivarius.
But the passing is so deadly only because the rest of her skill set is so well rounded. She can wreck shop in the pick-and-roll, split doubles and get to the rim, smooth around in the midrange, cruise whip passes over your head all night, carve you up. On the break, forget about it. It’s Krakatoa. Get the hell out of there. Your life is in danger.
She plays at a pace that says you bend to me. The handle is maniacal. Real muahahaha stuff. For instance, Wings at Lynx. Two months ago. There’s 2:22 left in the second quarter, and Miles is bringing the ball across half-court. Fudd awaits. Miles walks her near the left wing, and Howard comes to the top of the key to set a ball screen. Miles goes left to right between her legs, rejects the screen, goes right to left behind her back, then cobra whips a crossover in front of Fudd, a little hesi-stepback combo that leaves Fudd grasping. Miles gets a parting screen from Howard for good measure, and Fudd arrives back into the play just in time for Miles to cash one from a distance.
That’s another thing; the jumper’s true enough. Plus, Miles isn’t afraid to pull from the boonies. She’ll fire from Minnetonka, from way out in Mankato, from Brainerd. She’ll fire from Voyageurs National Park, on the banks of Kabetogama Lake, near the Ontarian border, about four hours from Thunder Bay if you take Highway 11. If you want a more scenic route, you can take Highway 61, spin along the coast of Lake Superior. It’ll add another hour and a half to your drive, but, you know, it’s your call.
V. Party Time
Her fit in Minnesota has been absolutely seamless. She has been perfect, the exact right player, the exact right vibe. A team like the Lynx, with so many vet leaders who have been through the battles before, it takes a special kind of newcomer, a special kind of worker, to gain the respect and freedom she has earned so soon. She’s pitching in however she can. Because if you’re out there with her, she’s looking out for you. She wants to make you feel special. She wants to shower you with gifts. She wants you to be happy. She wants you to thrive. Based purely on how she plays, I feel comfortable saying she throws great parties.
This is because she’s paying attention to the little things. You come over to her place for a soiree, she’s making sure everybody gets something to eat, something to drink. She made brownies. She knows you can’t have nuts. She made some without the nuts. Everybody gets a cup, and they write funny names on them, and it’s really funny and everyone loves it and some people even take their cups home and display them. And later, when they see the cup, they think, That was a fun party. Miles is making sure there’s plenty of ice, cups, plates, napkins. She errs on the side of ordering too much food because she’d rather do that than run out.
She’s got things taken care of. Welcome to Olivia’s. It’s party time. She rules.
