TCU junior guard Mike Miles Jr. has declared for the 2023 NBA Draft.
After thanking numerous family members, coaches, teammates, TCU athletics staff, and more, the basketball player announced his intention to enter the draft during a press conference held at TCU on Wednesday.
“I, Mike Miles, will always be a Horned Frog and never forget my time spent at TCU,” Miles said. “Like my teammate, Eman[uel Miller] says, ‘Why not TCU?’ As of today, I am announcing that I will forego my last year of eligibility and declare for the 2023 NBA Draft.”
Miles was named the Preseason Big 12 Player of the Year entering the 2022-23 season and finished second in scoring among Big 12 players behind Kansas’s Jalen Wilson, earning second-team All-Big 12 honors.
The junior says he knew during the season this would be his last year at TCU.
“A couple games after my injury, I felt like I was ready,” he said as he answered questions from local media. “I felt like I had done everything; I got better. That’s all I could do.
Miles declared for the draft last year before retiring to TCU early in the pre-draft process. This time, he is much more sure about his decision.
“I already knew what they were going to say — percentages and stuff like that and being a better leader. Going into this year, I tried to do that. You can look up the percentages; they’re the best since I’ve been here. So, I feel like I did that.”
Miles shot a career-high 49.7% from the field this year, the best of any guard in the Big 12, and head coach Jamie Dixon acknowledged that was part of what makes this the right decision in his mind.
“The way he played at the end of this year, it’s time,” Dixon told the media. “He played at a high, high level. All the goals we put that he needed to do — we talked about field goal percentage — he shot 50% as a guard in the Big 12, the best conference in the country. He did everything he needed to do. He’s ready.”
Miles leaves as the first TCU player to be named All-Big 12 three times and as the program’s 15th-leading scorer.
He will wait to hear his name called during the 2023 NBA Draft on June 22.