From foster care to the Ivy League to the NFL: Meet Dante Miller, the newest New York Giant

For almost anyone else, this would have been a story about how an honest mistake and an inflexible bureaucracy robbed a football player of his chance to prove he deserved an opportunity to play in the NFL. But this is a Dante Miller story, so it ends with him signing with an NFL team anyway.

No matter the circumstances, Dante Miller wins.

He already overcame an entire world that seemed rigged against him from the start. He emerged from foster care, matriculated in the Ivy League and the SEC and as of Friday, Miller is a New York Giant.

There were times these past 18 months when that last part seemed impossible. Thanks to a miscalculation by South Carolina’s compliance department and the NCAA’s hamfisted version of justice, Miller was pulled off the field in 2022 and didn’t find his way back until South Carolina’s pro day last month. 

For most of that time, Miller toiled in obscurity so that when he did get his moment — all 4.27 seconds of it — NFL teams couldn’t help but notice.

We’ll explain how getting slow-played by the NCAA allowed the former Columbia and South Carolina tailback to sign with the New York Giants on Friday morning rather than waiting to see if he got drafted later this month. (Yes, this is the rare case where NCAA’s pacing might have accidentally helped an athlete find a better situation.) But let’s start at the beginning — before the brief taste of 80,000 screaming fans at Williams-Brice Stadium or the compliance department or the NCAA and more than a year of frustration. 

Let’s travel to Connecticut and look in on a 2-year-old Miller. His brother and sister already had gone to live with their grandmother. But Dante still lived with his mom, and she was addicted to drugs. One day, Miller’s mother dropped him off at a neighbor’s house.

She never returned.

After that, Miller got plunged into the foster care system in Connecticut. He bounced from one group home to another. He recalls four or five during his time in the system. At one, he remembers the foster parents would beat the children for eating snacks out of the pantry. “I had to fend for myself,” Miller said. “It brought me closer to God, and it made me grow up fast.”

Miller’s prized possession in those days was a portable CD player. In the moments when the world felt like it might swallow him, he slipped on his headphones and the voice of Kirk Franklin or Marvin Sapp would meld with the choir and transport him to a loving place. He’d never truly known that kind of place in his young life, but he knew it existed somewhere.

Miller’s grandmother tried to get him out of foster care to reunite him with his siblings, but she died before she could. When Miller was six, Antoinette Flowers decided to try again. Flowers is the first cousin of Miller’s birth mother. She’d never had children of her own, but she had love to give and a stable home in Rockingham, N.C. It took about two years. Flowers would visit Miller and reassure him. “Everything will be OK,” he remembers her telling him. Finally, the state of Connecticut released Miller to Flowers. On the drive from the airport, with a social worker following in another car, Flowers asked young Dante what he wanted to be when he grew up. “He said a preacher and a football player,” she said.

In North Carolina, Dante found the place he’d been seeking. He also found the person who could help guide him. Now he calls Flowers “mom.”

Miller remembers Flowers working to ensure he had everything he needed. She had a job at the post office when he arrived. Later, she started a party bus company while also taking shifts as a home healthcare worker. Yet she somehow always had time to help him with his homework.

Flowers remembers a kid who didn’t trust anyone at first, and why would he? She had to earn it. So she just loved him. She gave him structure at home. She taught him things parents should have taught him years earlier. When Miller arrived, his skin was dried out from years of neglect. Flowers showed him how to use cocoa butter to work it back into shape. 

Miller blossomed after Flowers learned how his seemingly boundless energy could be channeled into sports. If there was a ball and/or a clock involved, Miller played it. He played football, basketball and soccer. He ran track. He was on the swim team. (Please don’t ask what my swim times were,” Miller pleaded. “Let’s just say I was learning to swim as I was on the team.”) Flowers remembers offering homework help, but she also remembers Miller not needing much.

“His 40 time was always lower than his GPA,” she said. She laughed, but she wasn’t joking.

Richmond High has produced some great football players. Edge rusher Melvin Ingram starred at South Carolina and in the NFL. Dannell Ellerbe was a standout linebacker at Georgia who played eight years in the NFL. But what Richmond High hadn’t produced was an Ivy Leaguer — until Miller.

Columbia wasn’t the original plan. Miller, a member of the recruiting class of 2018, first committed to James Madison, which was then an FCS power. But when Miller started hearing from Columbia and Cornell coaches, he shifted his focus. He had extended family in Brooklyn, so Columbia especially intrigued him. Miller visited Columbia’s campus on Manhattan’s upper west side and fell in love. “I’m essentially from a small town,” he said. “So being there was like something out of the Wizard of Oz.” Plus, Miller thought if he could make it at an Ivy League school, he might inspire someone else to try. “I felt like it would be a good precedent to set,” he said.

Miller thrived at Columbia. The classroom was as challenging as he expected, but he met new friends from all over the nation and the world. He added foreign countries to his travel bucket list. On the field, he was named team MVP and first-team All-Ivy League after rushing for 814 yards on 145 carries (5.6 per carry) in 2021. He also added a nickname: Lil’ Turbo. But that breakout season came after the Ivy League had canceled the 2020 season because of the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Miller graduated from Columbia with a sociology degree, but he faced a choice. Players at Ivy League schools get four years to play four. They don’t redshirt. So even though Miller and his classmates’ junior season had been canceled, they couldn’t play for Columbia anymore. But they did still have eligibility at non-Ivy League schools.

Miller had to decide. He could try to parlay his best college season into a shot at the NFL. He could take his Ivy League degree and start his life after football. Or he could try college football at a higher level.

He chose option No. 3, and he transferred to South Carolina. There, the 5-foot-9, 200-pounder would get to test his skills against SEC players and possibly create some game tape that would help his chances of getting drafted.

Miller knew significant immediate playing time probably wasn’t going to happen. The Gamecocks had a budding sophomore star in MarShawn Lloyd. Juju McDowell had been named Freshman All-SEC the previous season. Christian Beal-Smith had joined the team after graduating from Wake Forest.

But that was fine, because as far as Miller and the people in South Carolina’s football office understood, he had two years. That was how his eligibility was communicated between the compliance office and the football staff. 

It wasn’t until Miller had played sparingly in six games in 2022 that South Carolina officials realized they’d made a mistake. Miller didn’t have two years to play. He had two years to play one. If he wanted to spend two seasons at South Carolina, he would need to redshirt the first. And the NCAA only allows players to play in four games before redshirting a season. 

Miller had played so little that Gamecocks officials thought they had a chance to get him a waiver from the NCAA. In his fifth game, he played three snaps for a total of 11.4 seconds of game time. In his sixth, he played two snaps for a total of 6.9 seconds of game time. Five snaps for 18.3 seconds would determine whether he could play in 2023.

South Carolina coaches asked if Miller wanted to just keep playing in 2022. Had he said yes, he might have split significant snaps with McDowell in the Gator Bowl against Notre Dame. But he thought he had a chance at a full season and possibly a bigger role. So he said he’d try his luck with the NCAA.

If the NCAA had a vice president of Common Sense, schools could send the basic facts of a case such as this one and get an idea of how the governing body might rule. Had someone in Indianapolis said on a Tuesday in October 2022 that the NCAA would be highly unlikely to bend on the four-game redshirt rule, Miller probably would have decided by that Wednesday to play out the 2022 season.

But the process dragged into 2023. Miller participated in spring practice, hoping for good news. Then he kept waiting. Finally, after spring practice and long after the deadline to enter the NFL draft, the NCAA finally ruled. Miller learned he’d be ineligible to play in 2023.

South Carolina coaches let him work with the program this past season so he could still feel like part of the team. He finished his sport management master’s degree and started work on an MBA. As for football, he could train for South Carolina’s 2024 pro day and hope for the best. 

But could he stay focused? Instead of a season worth of reps, his chance to play in the NFL probably would come down to whether he had intriguing enough measurables. Fractions of a second on a 40-yard sprint would determine whether Miller would ever play football again. 

For Miller, losing sight of the goal was never an option. He understands why a stranger might wonder why he’d keep grinding so hard when he already has an Ivy League degree and the attendant contacts that could set him up for success in a variety of fields. He can land a six-figure job if he wants. But Miller needed to keep trying to land one particular six-figure job. 

Football mattered too much. “It was my saving glory,” he said. “I love ball. I love to compete. I don’t take it lightly.”

He got a chance to put on pads again when a favor to a friend landed him in the College Gridiron Showcase all-star game in Fort Worth in January. There, Miller wondered why the scouts from NFL teams didn’t seem interested in scheduling meetings with him. Reminded he had far less tape than his counterparts, he resolved to find a way to make those scouts notice.

His chance came last month at South Carolina’s pro day. With representatives from every NFL team on hand to watch receiver Xavier Legette and quarterback Spencer Rattler work out, he’d have a moment where every eye would be on him. When he lined up for the 40-yard dash, he knew his chance had arrived.

Everything went quiet. He blasted off the line. Miller knew he was flying. As he neared the finish line, he could see scouts’ eyes widening as they kept one eye on him and another on their stopwatches.

Afterward, he learned several had him as low as 4.27 seconds. Louisville’s Isaac Guerendo had the fastest time of any running back at this year’s Combine with a 4.33-second 40. Miller’s 28 reps of 225 pounds on the bench press would have been the most by a running back at the Combine, beating Michigan’s Blake Corum by one. 

A long shot to make a camp suddenly looked like a player who might be a late-round draft pick. Scouts absolutely noticed Miller after pro day. Everyone had questions. But one scout called Miller’s agent Tom Mills with the most interesting question: Are you SURE your client is even draft eligible?

So Mills checked with the NFL. Because of the eligibility gaffe, Miller was not eligible for the upcoming draft. He should have been in last year’s draft, and failing that, he was eligible for last year’s supplemental draft (though no one knew it). That meant Miller wasn’t a potential late-round pick. He was a free agent, free to sign with any team he wished right now.

It also meant that unlike a drafted player whose salary is slotted, Mills could negotiate with multiple teams and get Miller the best possible deal. Plus, Miller would get to choose his team rather than the other way around. He could pick the city, and he could pick the roster that gave him the best chance of still having a job come September. 

Mills initially thought the process would stretch another week or so. As staffs came off the road following a string of pro days, Miller could make some visits, work out for teams and then see who wanted to sign him. To add even more intrigue, the NFL changed its kickoff rules to encourage more returns. Special teams coaches who worked on the rule surmise that the best return men in the new format will be blazing fast tailbacks because the play will more resemble a scrimmage run than a punt return or old kickoff return. Miller’s speed and skill set seem to fit what teams will need in a returner.

When Miller visited the Giants this week, they offered a deal. Mills had other team visits scheduled for Miller, but the Giants were keenly interested. Miller also loved the idea of moving back to New York, so he decided to sign and get to work.

After sitting out a season because of 5 plays and 18.3 seconds on a football field, 4.27 seconds on a football field will give Miller the opportunity he craved.