Roe Miller is a bit of a chameleon on the soccer field.

She can play in the midfield and put her team in a position to score, or she can score the goal herself. But she can also drop back and is just as comfortable as the last defender before the goalkeeper.

That could be where she’s most comfortable and it looks as though that’s where her athletic future will be as Miller, a senior at Wallkill High School, recently committed to play women’s soccer at Division II Pace University.

“I was looking at Pace for a very long time,” Miller said. “I know their soccer program is very good. All the coaches there are very good. Some of their players have played for (my club team), Quick Strike.”

That means she won’t be heading into a completely unknown situation as many collegiate athletes do. Miller said she knows a couple of the freshmen on the team, a sophomore and a couple of juniors.

According to Jesse Kolmel, who has been coaching Miller for six years, and an executive director at Quick Strike, said the club has been sending players to Pace for 15 years.

“It’s calming,” she said. “I feel comfortable knowing I’m going into it already knowing people. Obviously, I’m going to be nervous, but not as I nervous as I would have been if I didn’t know who some of the people were.”

Miller said she expects to play center back at Pace. It’s her favorite position.

“I love playing that position, but it doesn’t matter to me where I play on the field,” Miller said. “If the coach wants me to play a certain spot, I will.”

However, Kolmel said he believes it’s the position Miller is best suited for.

“She loves to defend; she loves to get into battles,” Kolmel said. “Her competitiveness. Those are all great attributes.”
Miller will join a Pace program that hasn’t played since 2019 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Setters went 11-7-1 and posted a 6-6-1 mark in the Northeast-10 conference. They reached the Northeast-10 quarterfinals, suffering a 4-1 loss to top-seeded St. Rose.

At one point during the season, they achieved National ranking, reaching No. 24 in the country on Sept. 24, 2019.

The 2019 season was one of the best seasons in the history of the program, which was launched in 1998 by current coach Mike Winn. They have reached the postseason seven times in the program’s 20-year history.

“It’s a phenomenal academic school,” Kolmel said. “That’s probably the first and most important thing. I think the second is, if you know the Millers, they’re a very tight-knit family and it allows her to stay close enough to home where the family can go and watch her play and be part of it.”

That’s exactly how Miller described the Setters, as a tight-knit family. It’s an atmosphere she’s been seeking out.

“That’s what I heard from travel team,” Miller said. “We look at each other as a second family. That’s what I went to look for, for them to push me and for me to push them.”

She’s excited about the environment she’s going to be walking into and she’s grown as a leader as she is captain of the Wallkill Panthers’ team, and she’s excited to push herself and work her way through the next four years.

“She’ll come in and find her way,” Kolmel said. “I’m looking for her to come in and start right away and contribute major minutes over the next four years. It’s not the easiest thing to do, especially going straight from high school and into college.”