Our Mission: Utmost strives to impact our community by Preparing with Purpose, Playing with Passion and Performing as one.
Our Vision: To educate and inspire the individual athlete to play basketball at their highest potential and in a way that carries over and can be applied to all areas of their life.
Our Location: Utmost plays and practices out of Owasso, OK. We are blessed to have the benefit of using several private and public courts in the community as we work towards ultimately building our own gym.
Our System: We coach players through offensive and defensive systems which promote the mastery of the game. We do not run specific set plays, but encourage players to learn to diagnose, read and react to the game as we play. This system allows the skills learned while with Utmost to most effectively transition back to playing with school teams.
At Oklahoma Utmost, our goal is to equip each willing athlete with the understanding of individual and progressive skills required to develop them in their role as a contributing member of their team (be it: elementary, middle school, high school, or college). Our individual player development program is focused on creating an environment where individuals can master skills that will filter into the team approach during practices and games. Developing self-confidence in the individual allows them to understand their value to the team. Athletes will be coached in a way that grows their individual skills but also allows them to benefit from engaging in a team atmosphere that requires each athlete to contribute their Utmost.
Utmost Basketball believes that anyone can reach their full potential and with guidance and encouragement, we strive to teach basketball mechanics in a way that impacts an athlete’s skill set no matter where they choose to play. Going through the motions wastes time and money. Mindless repetition kills joy and often times build bad habits. At Oklahoma Utmost basketball there is specific attention to detail. At times, less is more, especially when the “less” is fully understood and the specific mechanics are effectively added to the athlete’s overall skill set.
Purposeful practice sets the tone for the athlete to engage their sport with Passion. The sport of basketball is dynamic, fun, and a true joy to experience. At Utmost Basketball coaches take a sincere approach to coaching and hope that anyone who sticks with the sport of basketball does so because they are passionate about the game. Positively teaching athletes how to love the fundamentals of the sport, specifically: body control & position, conditioning, foot work, ballhandling, shooting, rebounding, defensive tenacity, and overall mental stability allows us to build self-confidence in each athlete which makes for a stronger team. It is our purpose to teach in such a way that practice becomes as much of a challenge and as fulfilling of a process as the games themselves.
With Purpose, and Passion, we carefully instruct Teamwork. Athletes who choose to be a part of an Utmost tournament team understand that our culture is one of Unity. Performing as one is reflected in many different ways, with the ultimate desire being winning games. Utmost Athletes are encouraged to have a balanced approach to winning, as we want them to walk through their lives with a victorious mind set. We play to win, and we lose to learn. It is our goal to teach this consistent mindset so that lives are affected due to the ability to serve those around you, support a teammate, prefer an official, control personal emotions, experience and overcome or learn from failure, setting of goals, and create lasting memories in an environment that vividly reflects the boldness of Jesus Christ. This mindset exists at Oklahoma Utmost for the purpose of building young men and women who learn to be overcomers regardless of situations and outcomes. We may lose a game, but we never lose heart.
Open communication is at the back bone of Oklahoma Utmost Basketball. Before or after tryouts, athletes and parents are encouraged to openly discuss the character of an Utmost Athlete;
Coach Dani Miller’s Background:
Utmost basketball is more than a team. It is the overflow of a life-long passion from a young girl who had enough determination to fuel every teammate she ever played with. Her tenacity was never asleep, and she often wept real tears as she slept in basketball uniforms at the end of a season. Utmost basketball is the realization that the unique passion inside each of us is destined to be shared with the world. Utmost basketball is a calling, and it is a dream come true all in the same breath.
Coach Dani started playing basketball in the 5th grade. The driveway at her home in Wichita, Kansas will always be a permanent place of remembrance. It is in this drive way that Coach Miller was instructed one-on-one. As an extremely skinny, lanky 5th grader, a passion was discovered. Despite the hours of form shooting “torture” and the inability to “lay” the ball up for a layup she looked far past her inabilities and knew she had stumbled across something that captivated her gaze. Her first year of basketball play in the 5th grade consisted of chasing the basketball back and forth as she would steal the basketball from the other team, sprint past everyone for a layup and instead of keeping her eyes on the prize and converting the layup for two points, the ball would slam into the backboard and go sailing over the heads of the players trailing behind and Dani would passionately chase the ball down and be the first to the ball and recreate the same cycle all over again.
Passion and motivation were never taught to Dani, instead it oozed out of her at rapid rate. The driveway lessons that followed the season of missed layups was the spark plug to a lifetime of successful interactions on the hardwood. Not much is needed to turn a lanky 5th grade girl into a competitive athlete, besides passion and motivation. The purposeful approach that fueled Dani’s skillset as an elementary and middle school girl is what Utmost basketball is centered around.
The lessons carved into her brain as a child, reflect a Father’s love. The driveway became a safe place for Coach Miller as she bounced the ball around cracks in the pavement, spun around water drains, and fell in love with the sport.
After relocating to the Chicago, IL area in 8th grade, Dani was a 4-year varsity starter at Oak Park and River Forest High School in Illinois. Despite overcoming two, back to back, season ending knee injuries in high school Dani was recruited to play college basketball for the legendary Chicago coach Bob Hallberg; at St. Xavier University in Chicago.
Dani Engleman- Miller finished her career at Saint Xavier University as a 4 year starter, 3 year team captain, and as the all-time leader in assists. Collegiate career highs consisted of 28 pts, 9 rebounds, 8 assists and 10 steals. Miller graduated from SXU in 2007 with a B.A. in Organizational Communication. Most importantly, while attending SXU Dani became a follower of Jesus Christ and her position in eternity became secure.
Upon college graduation in 2007, Dani worked in management at New Balance Chicago and then relocated to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Shortly after relocating Dani met her husband and they got married in July of 2009.
While beginning a family and becoming wife and mother to three wonderful children Dani laid athletic and basketball endeavors down. In 2016, Dani accepted the coaching role at Hope Christian Academy, working with middle school aged female athletes. The passion leapt out of her heart as she interacted with the fuel from her own childhood.
It didn’t take but one season of coaching to realize that her journey in life has been extremely specific and that the passions of her soul are real and placed there by the Creator. With the support of her husband, Dani birthed Utmost Basketball in 2017 in hopes to recreate the purposeful driveway lessons into the skillsets of local athletes with the intention to insert some fundamental purity back into the sport that carried Dani through life. The opportunities afforded to Dani as she chased the basketball through life were plentiful.
It is the desire of Utmost basketball and Coach Dani to teach a younger generation how to set goals, have faith, and achieve great things in life as they pursue their goals with passion and purpose. Utmost basketball exists to expose, enhance, encourage, experience and encounter the world around us. To God be the glory for the scarlet thread that chased Dani through her journey as a young woman and transformed her as she transitioned into adulthood.
According to Dani, it is a privilege to be on the sidelines, and in the lives of young athletes. It is a calling, and not to be taken lightly. Coaching is the overflow of purposefully placed passion. Coach Miller hopes to take a stand for purpose, passion and Unity, in her community and the world around her.
When Dani isn’t instructing or on the sidelines, she can be found enjoying: the smiles and lives of her three children and husband, sharing essential oils, sipping a latte, shoe shopping, or on a long run.
Utmost is a culture and lifestyle for Dani.
Dani firmly believes that if your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough. Miller’s dream list consists of owning and operating a multi-court hardwood facility that provides children and families the ability to enjoy “lessons from the driveway” in a culture that includes natural wellness and fellowship for the entire family. Miller also dreams of raising children and athletes that have a heart for the world around them, as she uses basketball training and coaching as a means to serve others.
Coach Skylar Miller’s Background:
Skylar grew up playing any and all sports he possibly could. From a very early age, Skylar loved to compete and knew he wanted to coach. For Skylar, Utmost is a blessing in that it opens up both of those avenues for his dreams to continue to grow.
As a multi-sport athlete, Skylar grew up working to be as well rounded as possible in all sports. Ultimately, in High School he invested his primary focus into football. It was Skylar’s hope to play at the collegiate level until he became seriously ill as Senior in High School. That illness led to Skylar giving up football and in that process, taking up golf. Eventually, Skylar earned a golf scholarship that following year to Hannibal-LaGrange college in Hannibal, MO. Golf continues to be one of his favorite past times and that focus of playing such a mechanical sport at a high level is a great resource for Skylar in working through shot mechanics, defensive positioning and ball handling skill development with current Utmost athletes.
After Hannibal-LaGrange, Skylar came back to the Tulsa area to work for a family oil and gas company before leaving to start his first company. In 2008, Skylar decided to become an independent business owner and founded Crossroads Restaurant and Crossroads 22 Coffeehouse in Skiatook. After two years of operating the Crossroads units, he sold them and founded STL Oil & Gas. Skylar operated independently in the Oil & Gas production business until 2015, when he merged STL with SM Oil and Gas, where he became the VP of Operations. He continues to serve with SM Oil today.
During his time with STL and SM Oil, Skylar was also blessed to serve as a youth and children’s minister in his childhood church. He worked to rebuild the children’s church ministry, and then developed and launched a new work in the youth department. These ministry opportunities taught Skylar a great deal about relating to students, learning to speak to them in a way that encourages and empowers young people to express their goals, dreams and desires and ultimately, to assist them in building a plan that helps them start to accomplish those things.
In 2012, Skylar was afforded the chance to serve on the board for a startup Christian school in Skiatook as well. He, along with an incredible leadership team, worked to build the original marketing and fundraising models for Hope Christian Academy and eventually came to serve as the Athletic Director and founder of the High School Boys Basketball program at HCA. This foray into the coaching world reignited those passions for competition, teaching and coaching that Skylar had so enjoyed as kid. Building a program from the ground up and seeing that program lead to the eventual successes of his athletes is and will always be one of Skylar’s proudest accomplishments. It is this experience with the power of sports in a young person’s life that motivates Skylar in building and developing UTMOST athletes to be the best versions of themselves that they can be!
As a co-founder of OK Utmost, it is Skylar’s desire to be a part of passing on to future generations the ability and desire not only to compete, but to learn to compete at the highest level. Skylar is a firm believer in teaching young athletes the “why” not just the “how” in all things basketball. No matter the sport, Skylar has always had an eye for seeing the mechanics behind both the team aspects and the individual movements. It is this whole-part-whole approach of breaking individual skills down before adding them back to a team environment that Skylar points to as making him an effective coach and communicator. Developing the whole athlete; vision, awareness, ability, strength and conditioning, and teaching that athlete how to leverage their unique ability to maximum effectiveness is Skylar’s primary motivation in working with young players.
Skylar lends more of a business background to the operations of OK UTMOST as well. His wide array of experience allows Skylar the ability to blend the best business and professional approach as possible to the operations of UTMOST basketball, while still maintaining and building strong personal relationships with the athletes and families that make up the UTMOST family.
Skylar’s long term dreams and vision are to see UTMOST continue to grow, not only in numbers, but also in our impact within our community. It is amazing the power sports can hold to build relationships and strengthen communities in our culture and it is Skylar’s hope that UTMOST can become one of those influencers in and around Owasso and the Tulsa Metro.