Sacred Heart Prep’s rookie baseball skipper has some notable role models

At the time, McMillan was more impressed with the talent of his Padres teammates. Specifically, he took with him the painful assignment of catching an electric right-hander, Julian Merryweather, who now pitches in the major leagues with the Toronto Blue Jays.

“That was the first time I was like: ‘Oh God, this is what real velocity looks like,’” McMillan said.

Now, McMillan is intent on developing a program with as much tradition as the Serra one that helped bore him. With the exit of Sacred Heart Prep head coach Anthony Granato following the 2021 season, McMilan was hired for his first varsity managerial role as the Gators’ new skipper.

“It’s the kind of place I saw I could plant some roots and really grow a program,” McMillan said. “It was just a fit for me and my future family.”

McMillan went on to play for the NCAA Division III program at University of Redlands, who now manages the team at Chapman University. Then, when his playing career ended after college ball, McMillan returned to Serra as a coach. He headed the junior-varsity Padres for two seasons in 2016 and ’17, where his first crop of players including future fourth-round draft pick of the Miami Marlins, catcher Cameron Barstad.

Then the NCAA Division I ranks came calling, as McMillan was hired as an assistant coach at Santa Clara University. It was there, in serving on the staff of head coach Rusty Filter, that he worked alongside one of the more accomplished coaches in collegiate baseball history, special assistant to the director of athletics, Mark Marquess.

In 40 years as the head coach at Stanford University, Marquess won 1,585 games, ranking No. 8 on the list of NCAA’s all-time wins leaders. Marquess — known affectionately as “9,” the number he wore at Stanford, by so many in the baseball world — stays in the mix as an unofficial coach in Filter’s dugout.

“9, he walks in the room and you’re kind of blown away and then you get to chatting with him and he’s just a genuine human being,” McMillan said. “Everything you’ve heard about him is true. … He treats everyone like they’re the most important person in the room … but his knowledge of the game is truly incredible.”

McMillan coached at Santa Clara for four years from 2018-21.

In taking over the program at SHP, McMillan inherits a program steeped in winning tradition. He crossed paths with the Gators just once during his playing career at Serra, but it was a memorable game as the then-junior went 2 for 4, including the only the only home run of his two-year varsity career.

SHP currently plays in the Peninsula Athletic League Ocean Division, the program’s first time in the PAL’s lower division since 2009. The Gators went on to play in the West Bay Athletic League under head coach Gregg Franceschi from 2010-13 before returning to the PAL, where they played in the upper Bay Division from 2014-21.

McMillan takes over from Granato, who ran GamePrep Baseball Academy partially out of the Atherton campus. Granato is now on staff at Skyline College.

“It’s been a smooth transition,” SHP senior Nolan Wilbur said of McMillan, “and I feel he brings out the best in players. And at the high school level, I think bringing out talent is objective No. 1. And I feel he’s really good at that.”