Ohio Wesleyan senior forward Macy Miller will open her final college season on Friday already holding one of Division III basketball’s top honors: D3hoops.com has named the Marysville-area star to its first-team preseason All-America squad for 2026-27, Ohio Wesleyan Athletics announced November 5. Miller, the reigning North Coast Athletic Conference Player of the Year, is a consensus first-team All-American and a first-team All-NCAC selection, according to the university’s release.
It is the third straight season Miller has appeared on the D3hoops.com preseason All-America list — she was a first-team pick last year and a fourth-team selection in 2024-25 — according to the North Coast Athletic Conference, whose own November 3 release confirmed the honor. Two Denison players joined her on the teams: senior Ada Taute on the first team and senior Abby Cooch on the third team, the conference said.
Miller, a 6-foot senior from Milford Center who played at Fairbanks, averaged a double-double last season — 16.2 points and 11.7 rebounds per game, along with 2.3 steals, 1.7 blocks and 1.6 assists — according to Ohio Wesleyan Athletics. Behind her, the Battling Bishops climbed as high as No. 7 in the D3hoops.com Top 25, earned an at-large NCAA Tournament bid and hosting rights, and finished 21-6 overall and 11-3 in the NCAC before falling to Washington University in St. Louis in the tournament’s second round, the university said.
Her junior year brought honors off the court as well. Miller was named a CSC Academic All-American on the first team — a double major in biology and exercise science carrying a 3.99 cumulative grade-point average — according to the conference, and she was also a WBCA Coaches’ All-American, the fourth in Ohio Wesleyan program history, and a finalist for the Jostens Trophy.
Ohio Wesleyan was picked second in the NCAC preseason coaches’ poll released in late October, according to the university, and the Bishops return senior Maddie Ebbert, a third-team All-NCAC pick who averaged 9.7 points and 5.7 rebounds a game last season, alongside Miller. The conference race is expected to run through Delaware and Denison, whose Taute and Cooch shared the preseason spotlight with Miller this week.
What happens next comes quickly: Miller and the Battling Bishops open the 2026-27 season on the road Friday afternoon, facing Illinois Wesleyan at 3:30 p.m. in the Hope Tip-Off tournament in Holland, Michigan, with a second tournament game on Saturday, according to Ohio Wesleyan Athletics. It is a preview of the test ahead — Illinois Wesleyan is a perennial Division III power — and the first chance for a preseason first-team All-American to start playing like one.
For Delaware County fans, the opener is the start of a farewell season worth following: a hometown star from just down the road in Union County, finishing a career that has already rewritten Ohio Wesleyan’s record of national honors, on a team picked near the top of its conference with designs on a fifth straight NCAA Tournament appearance.
Photo: JBTHEMILKER, CC BY-SA 4.0