Claire Miller '24 Recruiting Profile

I originally started soccer at the age of 4 in a church soccer league, and then on to rec soccer. I always liked soccer, but I was never serious. This was all until my friend told me about a brand new travel team starting in my area, the Dalton Red Wolves. I signed up thinking it would be a good way to keep in practice for school soccer, but not only did I practice, this team and coach made me fall in love with the game. The coach noticed my potential and has helped me to improve more than in my entire soccer career. This was a three years ago and now I am training almost every day and I never want to stop playing. Not only my teammates and my coach have made me love the game, but the competitiveness and leadership has as well. On previous teams not everyone was serious about the game and improving, but on this team we are all working to get better and be the best team we can.

On every team I play on, I try to be a good example and lead the team to work hard. I have seen how one player out of focus can ruin a whole team’s success. On and off the field I work hard and try to be an example, especially to my younger teammates. I believe that simple reminders to focus or a little bit of encouragement to my teammates can really help the team as a whole. On my travel team, I have always been one of the oldest players and I have been with the team since they started. That makes my role to always be at my best every practice and game that much more important. It also means that I need to be a good sport and show my teammates how to enjoy the game while still playing hard.

One of the ways I show good leadership is by also getting good grades and staying on top of my schoolwork. I am enrolled in all advanced classes and will be taking AP and IB classes throughout high school.  I have also already taken the ACT as a part of the Duke Tip program in middle school and look to improve my score to a 32 by the end of my junior year, or the equivalent on the SAT. This will allow me to get an academic scholarship as well as hopefully an athletic scholarship. My goal for high school is to maintain my 4.0 and be in the top 10 of my class.

Other than school and soccer, I also take dance classes. Dance has helped me in ways I could never imagine in soccer. As I have been training, I have realized that I have a slight advantage over my teammates since I have taken dance since I was 3. Overall, I have more coordination, core strength, balance and my footwork is better. My coach was worried about me maintaining both academics and two activities, however now that he has seen how much dance helps me in soccer he encourages me to keep dancing.

All of these things contribute to my goal, which is attending a Division 1 college on an academic and athletic scholarship and either going into education or sports therapy.