The unbreakable bond of Josh Harris and Jasai Miles

Most nights in Bloomington, after the last jump shot has fallen and the gym lights fade, you can find Josh Harris and Jasai Miles in the kitchen. Harris is usually at the stove searing steak — three or four times a week, according to his roommate — while Miles works on tacos or pasta nearby.

They call it a “buffet.”

After the plates are cleared, they move to the couch, pick up their controllers and dive into Fortnite, their friendly trash talk echoing through the apartment.

“He’s trash, he sucks,” Harris said with a smile back in May. “He’ll never be better than me at Fortnite. That’s not happening.”

Those late-night cooking sessions and gaming battles say more about their bond than any stat line ever could. They reveal a friendship built on comfort, competition and connection — the kind of bond that can only be formed through time, tension and shared history.

Harris and Miles, two transfers who arrived at Indiana this offseason from North Florida, have known each other for nearly a decade. But their closeness — the kind that makes them more like brothers than teammates — didn’t come easily.

“It’s funny, we actually started off not too close,” Harris admitted. “And then over time, we really built a bond. Last year we got super close. Now that we’re [at Indiana] and together again, yeah, that’s my dawg.”

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Their story began in the humid gyms of South Florida, when Miles was in eighth grade and Harris was in seventh. Back then, they were more competitors than friends, each convinced he was the better player.

They started off as acquaintances more so than friends. But competition has a way of forging respect, and as they grew up, their relationship began to change.

They spent some time together at Miami Country Day School before Harris transferred to Pembroke Pines Charter High School to finish his prep career. For a brief moment, their paths diverged. But in 2024, fate — or as Harris later put it, “The universe” — reunited them at the University of North Florida.

Miles was coming off a strong freshman season for the Ospreys when Harris arrived as a freshman himself. Harris, new to college life, looked up to the familiar face.

“He was really a great role model and person I could look up to last year,” Harris said.

Together, they became North Florida’s leading scorers and rebounders, transforming from high school standouts into one of the most dynamic duos in their conference. But more importantly, their friendship deepened. They learned how to lean on each other — not just on the court, but in life.

After the 2024–25 season, both entered the transfer portal. Miles made his decision first, committing to Indiana in early April. Harris followed a few weeks later, drawn in part by the chance to join his best friend again.

“We have a similar journey,” Miles said. “Coming from North Florida, coming from high school, we’ve been through a lot of the same things and have done a lot of things together. We’re just on the journey together.”

For Harris, that shared journey made everything easier.

“It made my decision easier knowing I’d have my brother with me from last year as well,” Harris said of his decision to come to Indiana this offseason.

In Bloomington, the two are inseparable. They live together, train together and hold each other accountable. If one has a bad practice, the other lifts him up. If one’s energy dips, the other finds a way to reignite it. They’ve become each other’s safety net — two young men navigating a new school, a new system and a new city with the comfort of something familiar.

Their nights in the kitchen have become a ritual, a kind of therapy wrapped in laughter and seasoning.

“If I cook something, he’ll cook another dish and we’ll have a little meal together,” Miles said.

“He makes the tacos and the pasta, and I usually make the steak,” Harris added. “We have a ‘buffet’ every couple of days.”

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From the outside, those “buffet” nights and Fortnite marathons might look like the ordinary life of college roommates. But to them, it’s more than that. It’s a reminder of how far they’ve come — from two middle school standouts in Miami gyms to two men who now push each other to be better every day.

Their relationship, once fueled by competition, now thrives on loyalty. They’ve grown from acquaintances into brothers, bound by shared ambition and a deep sense of mutual respect.

“It’s like we’re family … We’ll be friends for life,” Miles said. “We do everything together. That’s my brother right there.”

This season in Bloomington, they’ll share the floor again — the same way they share meals, laughter and late-night victories on Fortnite. Their connection is something deeper than basketball, something unteachable. It’s the kind of chemistry built through time, through trust, through a thousand ordinary moments that became something extraordinary.

Now, as they chase wins in cream and crimson, their story continues — two brothers bound not just by the game that brought them together, but by the connection they’ve built beyond it.

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