COMMITMENT: UVA basketball lands Oklahoma transfer guard Duke Miles
The Virginia Cavaliers men’s basketball staff is hot right now, picking up their third transfer commitment in as many days with Oklahoma’s Duke Miles joining North Dakota State’s Jacari White and Toledo’s Sam Lewis in the Wahoo backcourt.
Miles is a grad transfer who will be a sixth year with just one season of eligibility remaining. Virginia will be his fourth school after starting his career at Troy then spending a year at High Point and then Oklahoma. Additional schools that were interested in Miles include Memphis, Penn State, Virginia Tech, Creighton, Vanderbilt, LSU, and a handful of others.
Last season, the 6-foot-2 guard averaged 9.4 points, 2.5 rebounds, and 2.0 assists per game, shooting 51.4% from the field and 43% from behind the arc on 2.7 deep balls per game. He’s a career 35.0% shooter from three, but had a career year as a shooter in 2024-25.
Miles most likely projects to be UVA’s starting point guard next season. He played as a secondary (and sometimes tertiary) ball handler for the Sooners last season. But, in his previous stops (particularly at High Point) Miles played as a lead guard and worked to create offense for his teammates. He can score at all three levels with the burst and the physicality to get by a defender and then finish at the rim. Impressively for a player his size, he made 65.4% of his shots around the basketball at Oklahoma despite.
If Miles can continue to shoot the ball like he did at Oklahoma while playing as UVA’s point guard, that’d be impressive. Yet he still shot 36.0% from three at High Point while playing point guard and taking a higher volume of deep balls (3.7 attempts per game). Frankly, that season is likely a more apt comparison for what his role will be in Charlottesville. Miles is an active on ball defender who can disrupt ball handlers and get in passing lanes. He should fit well into what Ryan Odom wants to do in transition as well.
With Miles, Virginia adds yet another guard to what is becoming a solid core in the backcourt. The former Oklahoma Sooner joins Chance Mallory, Elijah Gertrude (assuming he doesn’t portal), Jacari White, and Sam Lewis in the backcourt for the ‘Hoos.
Miles is also another transfer who has not visited Charlottesville, continuing the trend from the White and Lewis commitments. Like they did for those two, the Cavaliers likely dropped a bag which Miles couldn’t refuse.
Now, Odom and his staff will prioritize making additions to the frontcourt, which is awfully empty right now. While Miles is a good addition, he’s not necessarily the star point guard that would reset UVA’s ceiling for next season. That makes recruiting studs in the frontcourt that much more important if the ‘Hoos want to get back to the NCAA Tournament. Right now, Virginia has former VCU high school commit Silas Barksdale and preferred walk on Carter Lang.
VCU freshman center Luke Bamgboye is one to watch who could very well follow Odom to Charlottesville after visiting over a week ago. Otherwise, the Cavaliers will look to add a star power forward and at least one or two other big men to be able to play the deep rotation Odom prefers. UVA will probably still look to add one, maybe two more guards as well.