A Chabot Success Story - McMiller, Glads On The Move

After news broke that Chabot men’s basketball head coach Keenan McMiller had guided the Gladiators to their first Coast-North Conference championship in 20 years, the response across the state was breathtaking.
A tweet that recognized the team’s achievements and McMiller’s becoming the first African-American coach to win a Coast-North men’s basketball title received over 25,000 views.
McMiller, a former Chabot player on a State playoff team, was also named conference Co-Coach of the Year.
“It’s been exciting. It’s been surreal. It’s been a blessing,” McMiller said humbly. “… It’s definitely been gratifying. I know we’ve put in the work.”
But the Gladiators’ job is far from done.
The No. 7-seeded Gladiators (20-8), after a first-round bye, will open the CCCAA NorCal Regional Playoffs against No. 10 Los Medanos College (22-7) on Saturday in the second round at home, needing two wins to reach the State’s Elite Eight. Tipoff is 7 p.m.
“They’re hungry,” McMiller said of his players. “Practice has been great since our loss to City (to open conference play), so it’s better and better every week, so they’re ready. They’re ready to play. It’s great that we had a bye for the first time.”
Last week, Chabot capped conference play in resounding fashion — walloping College of San Mateo 103-70 and Skyline 107-76 — to extend its winning streak to 13 and earn a co-championship with CCSF, ranked No. 2 in the state and seeded No. 1 in the north regional.
The Gladiators, ranked No. 14 in the CCCMBCA Top 30 poll, boast a talented group of serious student-athletes. Diggy Winbush, a highly accomplished sophomore guard out of Taft High (Los Angeles), was conference Co-MVP and All-State. David Hector (Moreau Catholic), also a sophomore guard who had a stretch of 15 consecutive double-doubles this season, made First-Team All-Conference along with Zach Broadous (Fr. G, LA Premier Prep) and Jaiden Rivera (So. G, Golden State Prep), who also made First Team All-Defense. David Ogunleye (6-9, F, Stephen Austin-Texas) was Honorable Mention.
McMiller raves of Broadous’ “tremendous work ethic” and his strength in the classroom. He says Winbush is very spiritual and a good student who is going to get a communications degree. He is likely to land with a Big West program. “He faced professional talent on the Atlanta Celtics (Youth Athletic Program)," McMiller says of Winbush, whom he recruited for two years.
Of Hector, McMiller says, “He’s a bull. He’s the best guard rebounder in the state; also shooting it.”
The coach also lauds the improved defense of Ogunleye as a rim protector. Ogunleye has improved on offense, even though his numbers have come down a bit this season. He’s also a solid student with a 3.2 GPA. All of Chabot's top players are likely to end up in lower Division I programs.
McMiller was hired in May 2018 to give the Chabot program a lift, as he did at Merritt College in guiding the Thunderbirds to two trips to the State Final Four during a successful nine-year run. Mission accomplished in Hayward.
Chabot, which was 3-24 overall and 1-11 in conference the season before McMiller took over, is moving up quickly in the state’s hierarchy. The Gladiators finished with 18 wins last season and advanced to the second round of the playoffs. The 2020-21 season was canceled due to the COVID pandemic, after the Glads finished 17-12 (8-6 in conference) in 2019-20. Chabot was 11-17 (4-8 in conference) in 2018-19 — McMiller’s first season.
Before its current winning streak began, Chabot dropped three in a row, but after a trust-building trip to Avila Beach in San Luis Obispo County during a trip to a tournament, the Gladiators started hitting their stride. Of the team-bonding trip, McMiller said the players didn’t see the gain from it immediately, but the groundwork was in place.
“I think that bonding trip played a huge role in (the team’s conference success), helping them build camaraderie and trust with themselves and us, and we were able to play as a team and get better and better and better each game,” McMiller said.
Chabot opened conference play with a 20-point loss to CCSF, but it was one for the oddity files. A lot of things went wrong for Chabot, which still played very competitively and outscored the host Rams 49-46 in the second half.
“In that game I had three guys that had flu and played and then we had Zach Broadous who five minutes into the second half comes down with hives, literally. His eyes swelled up like Incredible Hulk-type stuff, Marvel Movie-type stuff. Eyes swell up, lips swell up, all the literal bumps start going all over his body,” McMiller recalled. “They had to put the game down for about 20-25 minutes and call the paramedics, and so in that game we had a whole bunch of stuff going on, but it was a competitive game at one point.
He assured his players, ‘If we can go through all of that, fellas, we can do pretty well,’ because we ended up winning the second half, even though Zach ended up going to the emergency room," the coach said.
The loss morphed into a teaching tool. Belief grew. The team has not lost again since.
Chabot players compete and train hard, not just for themselves but for the coach too. They all have a close bond. McMiller cites the quality of time they spend together, not just the quantity of time.
“A lot of meals, a lot of film study, a lot of just talking about life in regards to the classroom, off the court and obviously basketball, and just being transparent with them so they respect, — it doesn’t mean they always agree — but they respect that relationship,” McMiller says. “I think coming out of COVID a lot of young people haven’t had that: A lot of time to themselves, not around a lot of people and having the ability to come back into society and have a place where you can build those types of relationships that I’m still trying to build as a goal on the direction I want to go.”
He added that “for these guys it’s been priceless; they’re good young men and they’re just trying to figure it out and raise the bar of the expectations for them.”
His goal, over and above basketball, is to get players to think about “how they want to be as a human being and what you want to leave that makes life better,” he says.
There’s no “wiggle room” with him, he says. “You’re either gonna step up or we need to go a different direction with you,” he says. “They’ve all decided that it’s something they want to do.”
It's a success story that is drawing praise statewide.