NCAA Basketball: Ranking the 10 best head coaching hires of 2022 offseason
By Joey Loose
9. Archie Miller (Rhode Island)
For much of the 2000’s and early 2010’s, there wasn’t too much to be excited about at Rhode Island until Dan Hurley’s successful stint with the program. After Hurley left for Connecticut, assistant David Cox took over the Rams program, but things just quite weren’t the same. It wasn’t the right fit, and Cox wasn’t quite the right pedigree of coach to make Rhode Island a consistently successful A-10 program.
Miller knows all about that, having built sustained success at Dayton himself. A former player at NC State and the son of a high school coach, Miller bounced around as an assistant, serving under Thad Matta and brother Sean, before Dayton gave him his first head coaching position in 2011. Miller accumulated 139 wins across six seasons, leading the Flyers to four straight NCAA Tournaments and an Elite Eight run in 2014. Miller spent four seasons leading Indiana before being fired in 2021; a forgettable stretch for the program and coach.
Now, Miller is presented a perfect opportunity to bounce back and get back into the saddle. He did phenomenal work at Dayton, putting the Flyers firmly in the conversation for postseason success each and every year. He’s back in the A-10 and in position to build that kind of success again at Rhode Island, a program that certainly needs to take a step forward in a tough mid-major league. There was a lot of pressure at Indiana; Miller will be far more successful with these Rams.