On This Day: Juwan Howard's Return To Michigan Is Official

The former Fab Five member was formally introduced as head basketball coach of the Michigan Wolverines two years ago on this day.

Michigan's Juwan Howard has gotten off to as good of a start as anyone in Ann Arbor could have hoped.  

It was exactly two years ago to the day that Howard was formally introduced as the head basketball coach of the Michigan Wolverines.  Though the decision to bring in Howard was largely praised by the Michigan faithful, a good portion of the sports world viewed Howard's hiring by Michigan as a "dud".  Howard had spent the previous six years serving as an assistant coach for the Miami Heat from 2013-2019, but had no head coaching experience prior to taking the job at Michigan.  Due to the lack of heading coaching experience, many believed that he simply wasn't ready for the challenge of leading a program like Michigan within a conference like the Big Ten.

Turns out, many people were wrong.

Prediction: There are plenty more tears of joy to come. #OTD in 2019, @JuwanHoward was introduced as @umichbball head coach. 〽️ pic.twitter.com/qbH4wqCI4c

— Michigan On BTN (@MichiganOnBTN) May 30, 2021

During Howard's first season at the helm, the Wolverines fought their way to a 19-12 record before the 2020 college basketball season came to a halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic.  The following season, Howard coached Michigan to it's first regular season Big Ten title since 2014 and an appearance in the NCAA Tournament's Elite Eight - Michigan's fourth appearance since 2013.  

As a result of his second year success, Howard would be named the 2021 Big Ten Conference Coach of the Year, Sporting News Coach of the Year and Associated Press College Basketball Coach of the Year - along with becoming the first person in NCAA history to enter the tournament as a No. 1 seed as both a player and a coach.  Howard also became the first Michigan Basketball coach to reach 23 conference wins within their first two seasons as head coach. 

As if that isn't enough to celebrate, Howard and co. also assembled the No. 1 recruiting class in the nation for 2021 - including top prospects like forward Caleb Houston, center Moussa Diabate and point guard Frankie Collins to name a few.  Along with his phenomenal recruiting class, Howard also dipped into the transfer portal once again to secure the commitment of transfer point guard DeVante' Jones out of Coastal Carolina - the 2021 Sun Belt Player of the Year and one of the best guards available in the portal.  

Needless to say, Juwan Howard is off to a pretty good start in Ann Arbor - and it looks like it's only going to get better.