Juwan Howard fired by Michigan basketball after 5 seasons

Juwan Howard will not return as head coach of the Michigan basketball program for the 2024-25 season.

U-M AD Warde Manuel parted with Howard on Friday after five seasons.

"After a comprehensive review of the program, I have decided that Juwan will not return as our men's basketball coach," Manuel said in a statement released Friday. "Juwan is among the greatest Wolverines to ever be associated with our basketball program. I know how much it meant, to not only Juwan, but to all of us for him to return here to lead this program. Despite his love of his alma mater and the positive experience that our student-athletes had under his leadership, it was clear to me that the program was not living up to our expectations and not trending in the right direction.

"I am thankful for Juwan's dedication, passion and commitment to U-M and for all that he, and his legacy, will continue to mean to Michigan."

The Wolverines (8-24, 3-17 Big Ten) just finished a season with the most losses in the 107-season history of the program and have missed back-to-back NCAA tournaments for the first time since 1999-2008.

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Michigan was 87-73 under Howard overall, but went just 26-40 the past two seasons. Howard will be paid a $3 million buyout since the firing happened prior to June 30, per his contract, which had two years remaining.

Back in January, Manuel said he wasn't yet ready make a judgement on Howard's job status. And there were mitigating factors for this season, particularly Howard's heart surgery in September.

“I think (patience) is the key with all of our programs,” Manuel said in January. “Juwan is working with the staff, with the team to win, but let’s not discount what personally Juwan has been through. That is also a concern and focus of mine that he is OK and that he’s getting through this.”

Surgery or not, the trend had, without question, been in the wrong direction. Michigan went 1-10 in the regular season after those comments and finished with the second worst Big Ten defense in the past decade.

Of course, that's a far cry from how the tenure began.

Michigan was poised to make the NCAA tournament in 2020 before the season was cut short by the coronavirus pandemic. The next season, Howard and U-M returned to familiar heights when they won the Big Ten regular-season title and earned a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament.

The former Fab Five star was named 2021 Associated Press Coach of the Year. U-M reached the Elite Eight before suffering a 51-49 loss to UCLA.

But that season proved to be an outlier: In the following three seasons, Michigan went 45-55, with more losses each successive campaign.

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Michigan opened the 2021-22 season ranked sixth in the USA TODAY Sports Coaches Poll, reaching as high as fourth before a months-long stumble. The Wolverines were 6-3 in early December, then went 11-11 the rest of the way.

Michigan earned an 11-seed in the NCAA tournament, then pulled off consecutive upset wins over 6-seed Colorado State and 3-seed Tennessee to bring the program to a record fifth consecutive Sweet 16, where it lost to Villanova.

The impressive tournament run salvaged the season, but the overall slide continued.

Last season, U-M opened the season 7-3, then went 10-12 over its final 22 games and missed the NCAA tournament for just the second time since 2010. That was a low point for the program — until this season.

Michigan was 6-5 in mid-December, but then dropped 18 of its next 20 games and finished in last place in the Big Ten for the first time since 1966-67. Before this season, U-M hadn't lost five straight games in more than a decade. It happened three different times this year.

Even beyond losses on the court, Michigan's program under Howard had its issues. In 2021, Howard had to be physically restrained on the court during the second half of a Big Ten tournament game after he charged at Maryland coach Mark Turgeon and was subsequently ejected.

The following season, he smacked Wisconsin assistant staffer Joe Krabbenhoft in the face during a skirmish in the postgame handshake line; he was suspended the final five regular-season games, fined $40,000 and put on a "zero tolerance" policy.

This past December — before he was officially reinstated as acting head coach from when he stepped away from heart surgery — Howard and longtime strength and conditioning coach Jon Sanderson got into an altercation.

It followed a back-and-forth where Sanderson had told a frustrated senior forward Jace Howard, Juwan's son, to stop berating a trainer, which led to the elder Howard coming toward and yelling at Sanderson, who stood his ground and yelled back, per The Athletic.

Sanderson filed an HR complaint and was moved elsewhere in the athletic department before he resigned earlier this month.

A person with knowledge of the situation told the Free Press the policy was not violated because there was "nothing that warranted" any further punishment once HR did its own investigation and deemed nothing was physical in nature.

Point guard and leading scorer Dug McDaniel still managed to be suspended for six away games due to academic progress issues, which played no small part in torpedoing the season.

U-M's most recent Big Ten tournament loss brought its disastrous season to a fitting end.

Now that the No. 1 question has been answered about the future, here are a few more.

Which players return? Might McDaniel stay in Ann Arbor or look to transfer somewhere closer to his roots in the Washington/Maryland/Virginia area? Tray Jackson, Jaelin Llewellyn, Olivier Nkamhoua — three transfers who arrived during Howard's tenure — are all out of eligibility.

Terrance Williams II and Nimari Burnett both went through senior day ceremonies last weekend; although Williams has one year of eligibility remaining and Burnett has two, neither implied their returns were imminent.

That apparently leaves Jace Howard, , Youssef Khayat, Tarris Reed Jr., Will Tschetter and George Washington III as the lone scholarship players a new coach would be looking to keep. Michigan also has two incoming recruits, Michigan's Mr. Basketball Durral Brooks, from Grand Rapids, and Christian Anderson, from Georgia via Oak Hill Academy in Virginia, but neither are consensus top 100 prospects.

And they are now afforded a free release from their national letters of intent with a coaching change.

The third incoming player could be Khani Rooths, a fringe five-star power forward from IMG Academy in Florida who is verbally committed, but yet to sign.

Contact Tony Garcia: apgarcia@freepress.com. Follow him at @realtonygarcia.