The Juwan Howard era is officially over at the University of Michigan. Michigan announced Friday that they have severed ties in a coaching capacity with Howard after five years at the helm of his alma mater, and arguably the worst season in program history.
There will be an expansive national search to find Howard’s successor that will begin immediately. Howard, who had two years and approximately $7 million remaining on his contract will receive a $3 million buyout.
He ends his Michigan coaching career posting a final record of 82-67, that included an Elite Eight, a Sweet 16 appearance and one 20-win season. He also was one game above .500, with a 48-47 record in Big Ten play with one conference title and one finish better than fifth place in the league standings.
The dismissal brings an abrupt end to a roller coaster ride that was Howard’s tenure. The Fab Five member was brought back to lead his alma mater in May 2019 and took over a program that was extremely successful under former coach John Beilein, who left for the NBA to coach the Cleveland Cavaliers, and that was a disaster to say the least. But Howard could not manage the pressure to keep up that same level of excellence during his first time as a head coach at any level and things rock bottom with a historically awful eight-win campaign that ended in the opening round of the Big Ten tournament.
During the 2023 campaign, Michigan set dubious program records for the most conference (17) and total (24) losses. They finished tied for the second-lowest win percentage (.250) in the program’s 107 seasons. They were in the basement in the Big Ten standings for the first time since the 1966-67 season. It recorded single-digit victories for the first time since 1981-82. They finished the season unceremoniously on a nine-game losing streak, the longest skid since Michigan dropped 10 straight in 2004-05.
To add insult to injury, Michigan suffered its most lopsided loss in 17 years in a 32-point drubbing at Purdue and had more losses by at least 15 points (nine) than wins. The Wolverines also finished with some of the program’s worst defensive numbers in decades.
Embed from Getty ImagesThat is just one part of the story, the poor on-court results. That is not even including all the off-the-court developments that occurred during Howard’s final season, which was the most bizarre and disappointing of them all.
There was the unusual coaching dynamic where he served as an assistant coach as he transitioned back to his full-time head coaching duties following September heart surgery. There was the verbal confrontation he had with longtime strength and conditioning coach Jon Sanderson at an early December practice that sparked an internal review and led to Sanderson, who helped build up players’ bodies and the program for a decade and a half, no longer working with the program before resigning on March 1.
There was the decision to hand the coaching reins to assistant Phil Martelli in his return to Philadelphia, for a Big Ten matchup at the Palestra against the Penn State Nittany Lions at a point in time where Michigan was careening fast and had lost six of eight. Then there was the unheard-of academic suspension he placed on Dug McDaniel, which did not allow the sophomore guard to travel with the team for road games.
All that was child’s play in comparison to a couple of incidents that put a black eye on Howard’s tenure. The most egregious was the postgame altercation at Wisconsin in February 2022, when Howard took exception to a late timeout and got into a heated argument with Badgers head coach Greg Gard in the handshake line. Things got out of hand quickly and Howard struck Wisconsin assistant Joe Krabbenhoft in the head. The Big Ten put the hammer down and suspended Howard for the final five games of the 2021-22 regular season and gave him a hefty fine of $40,000 for his actions.
The season prior to that, Howard was ejected in the second half of a Big Ten tournament quarterfinal when he got into a shouting match with then-Maryland coach Mark Turgeon during a media timeout. The two had to be separated and Howard, who was accessed two technical fouls, was physically restrained by several staff members before he was escorted off the court.
The fiery exchange with Turgeon occurred during Howard’s second, and best, season at the helm. In Year 2, the Wolverines won the Big Ten regular-season title, via win percentage during the COVID-19-shortened season, earned a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament for the third time in program history and fell a shot short of reaching the Final Four. Howard received a plethora of coaching honors, highlighted by being selected as the 2021 Associated Press National Coach of the Year and Big Ten Coach of the Year.
Howard and the Wolverines never came close to repeating that success, as the program slowly but surely fell off a cliff from that point on. Over the next two seasons, Michigan finished 19-15, and 18-16, respectively, marking the first time since the early 2000s the program failed to win at least 20 games in back-to-back years.
Michigan bounced back, salvaging the 2021-22 campaign, one where the Wolverines entered as a preseason top-10 team and the favorite to repeat as Big Ten champions, by making a Sweet 16 run. That was followed by another mediocre regular season and another middle-of-the-pack finish in the conference standings that led to Michigan missing the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2015, with a team that featured an All-American and two top-15 NBA Draft picks.
Howard was hired by athletic director Warde Manuel and signed an extension in November 2021 that ran through the 2025-26 season, but he did not do a good enough job to see it through.
