Sports

Kiyomi McMiller’s Publicist Is Unresponsive Amid Mysterious Rutgers Basketball Suspension Drama

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Kiyomi McMiller Leonard Ellerbe Publicist Sparkle Callahan Rutgers Basketball Suspension
Rutgers Athletics

Women’s college basketball phenom Kiyomi McMiller returned to the starting lineup for Rutgers on Sunday after a two-game suspension for undisclosed reasons. However, there was some confusion about her status prior to the game and it made an already messy situation even more so.

The five-star freshman’s publicist is not responding to requests for comment.

McMiller, a native of New Jersey, is the highest-rated player in program history. She committed to Rutgers over offers from UCF, James Madison, Penn State, Florida State, Kentucky, Georgia, Ohio State, Syracuse and Texas A&M, among others. It was a huge get.

The Scarlet Knights are hovering right around .500 through the first two and a half months of the season but their star guard is hooping. McMiller averages 19.9 points, 5.4 rebounds and 3.2 assists per game and might already have the best handles in college hoops.

Although Rutgers is pretty hapless without her, McMiller did not play against JuJu Watkins and top-five USC last week. Nobody knew why. The mysterious absence was a coach’s decision but head coach Coquese Washington refused to expand further on the matter.

Meanwhile, Leonard Ellerbe insinuated that Kiyomi McMiller could decide to transfer because of the drama. The legendary boxing promoter, known best for his time with Mayweather Promotions, serves as an advisor to the superstar freshman.

McMiller’s father ultimately shut down the possibility of transferring even though his daughter remained on the bench for Wednesday’s blowout loss to Minnesota. It was super weird.

Nobody knew whether Washington was going to put her best player back in the lineup on Sunday. As a result, she was listed as “questionable” in the Big Ten availability report. Ellerbe said that was nonsense. He directed any further questions to McMiller’s publicist, Sparkle Callahan.

But here’s the thing. Richie O’Leary of the Rivals network reached out to Callahan on Friday and never received an answer. The publicist did not respond to his message.

This whole saga involving Kiyomi McMiller has been unnecessarily chaotic. She has multiple people speaking on her behalf while the one person tasked with speaking on her behalf stays silent. Not ideal!