SACCO: It’s business as usual for Draft’s Miller in Radford

STUARTS DRAFT
There doesn’t seem to be much different about Jessica Miller.

She looks like a regular student at a regular high school — Stuarts Draft — with a typical teenage smile.

She twirls her tennis racket nervously when you talk to her. She wears a purple tennis skirt (her favorite color, she says) and, in some typical sports superstition, she double knots her tennis shoes before practice and triple knots them before a match.

She’s 14, makes easy conversation – peppered with “like” and “you know” – and seems like she could be anybody’s little sister.

So, yeah, what’s the big deal?

Then you watch her play tennis. You take a few moments to sit on the practice court and wince as she punishes neon green tennis balls and places them deftly within the white lines. You watch her bounce back and forth on the court, feet always moving, eyes always following the ball, and you see what’s special about her.

Yet, for some reason or another, she laughs off the label “sophomore sensation” even if her coach, Tom Goforth, nods his head when you ask if she is such a clichéd thing.

“She sure is,” says the coach. “She sure is.”

She, however, would beg to differ.

“I don’t really think I’m a ‘sensation,’ ” she says, breaking into a happy-go-lucky smile and wiping a strand of hair – normally red, but burnt to a dark blonde thanks to the sun – from her face. “It depends on how long you’ve been playing, rather than how old you are.”

And she’s been playing since she was “like 10.” So maybe that’s the reason the Cougar sophomore – remember she’s not quite sure she’s a “sensation” – is playing today at 9 a.m. in Radford against Jamestown’s Kelly Little.

She’s the Region III representative in the Group AA Final Four and she still needs her father, Tom, to drive her to practice. How atypical.

“It’s exciting,” she says at the mere mention of the state Final Four. “Everybody is like, ‘when is states?’ When I tell them it’s Thursday, they’re like ‘that’s really exciting, you get to miss the last day of school.’ ”

She sees the comedy in that and, amid twirling the yellow handle on a racket resting on her shoulder, she laughs.

Despite her youth, this isn’t Miller’s first foray into the postseason. Her 6-4, 6-2 win over R.E. Lee’s Rachel Obenschain in the Southern Valley District singles tournament was her second straight such title. And, last season, she advanced to the Region III championship where Jefferson Forest’s Morgan Huff “kind of creamed me,” Miller says.

This season, she got over the regional hump by beating Obenschain, this time 6-1, 6-2. After the win that sent her to states it was business as usual for Miller, who screamed “out” before her routine of picking up the balls and heading to the bench.

“And there’s my mom [watching] and she started to cry and I was like, I’m going to cry now,” she says. “You know, stuff like that.”

Miller’s not too sure if there’s any pressure on her this season. She’s young, after all, and with two more years of varsity play ahead of her, she’s realistic of her goal today. All she wanted to do this year was to make it farther than last. She’s accomplished that.

“If there’s pressure,” she says. “I won’t let it affect me. I just try to get out there and do the best I can no matter what the circumstances are.”

Her father, Tom, says that’s what makes her so special. Tennis, says the still-avid player, can be a frustrating game. His daughter remains cooler than mint mouthwash.

“She stays focused,” he says.

And Goforth would agree.

“This kid, she’s not your typical 10th grader,” he says. “She’s handled all of this extremely well.”

Miller, Goforth says, “is one of the finest leaders I’ve ever had the opportunity to work with.”

“Most kids her age that have done what she’s already done, their heads wouldn’t fit into this tennis area,” he says, motioning toward the court. “But she’s remained grounded.

“She works hard every day.”

“She makes straight As.”

Goforth goes on and on and on.

Kind of like Miller this postseason.

The girl who, off the tennis court, doesn’t appear all that different.

“Her looks,” Goforth says, “are very deceiving.”