ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, August 2, 1996 TAG: 9608020025
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: DOUG DOUGHTY STAFF WRITER
JOHN MILLER, a tackle from Bassett, becomes the fourth Virginian to commit to the Blue Devils this year.
An opportunity to play for ex-National Football League offensive lineman Joe DeLamiellure was a major selling point for Bassett High School tackle John Miller, who said Thursday he has committed to Duke.
DeLamiellure, who went to Duke last winter from Liberty University, was the assistant coach responsible for recruiting Miller and also will coach him on the offensive line.
``That was a big deal for me,'' Miller said. ``He told us he wouldn't ask us to do anything that he wouldn't have done himself. When I was there for camp, he was just as dirty and sweaty as the players.''
Miller said Virginia was briefly in the lead when he returned home from a week at the Cavaliers' camp, but he basically had made up his mind by the time he visited Duke's campus Wednesday.
``I just got to thinking, if something happened to me in football, Duke was the place where I wanted to go to school,'' Miller said. ``I felt Duke had a better school [than Virginia] and I liked the coaches.''
Miller, who has a 3.9 grade-point average and scored 1,240 on the Scholastic Assessment Test, has followed Duke's men's basketball team but said the Blue Devils trailed early in a field that included UVa, N.C. State and Virginia Tech.
Miller (6 feet 7 1/2, 290 pounds) was rated one of the top 25 prospects in the state by The Roanoke Times after his junior year and has emerged as the most heavily recruited player in Timesland. Duke clearly has made inroads into Virginia this year, with commitments from four Virginia-bred prospects, including DeLamiellure's son, Todd, who played at E.C. Glass in Lynchburg.
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