The Howard Interview. Juwan Howard sat down with Brendan Quinn for what Quinn says is his first one on one interview in two years. That, in and of itself, is part of the issue. This section is kind of like… well… I mean…?

In the end, Howard says he wishes he’d opened up more. He wishes people knew junior forward Will Tschetter keeps a garden in his backyard, where he and Jenine grow jalapeño, kale, bell peppers, lettuce. He wishes he’d been more open about his feelings on going from one-game shy of the Elite Eight in March 2021 to outcast in March 2022. He wishes he hadn’t been so reticent about his heart surgery. He wishes people knew that, during the interview, former captain Eli Brooks called to check in on him.

He says he wishes he let people get to know him.

One of the issues with hiring a first-time head coach is that sometimes they don't know the shape of the job. They've seen it, they've been around it, but being it for the first time is something different. Especially when you come from a Miami Heat organization where all that stuff is minimized because you have a long-term, secure coach in a well-run organization. Beating the bushes is not a thing that Howard ever had to do.

The other main takeaway from the interview is that Howard should not have coached this year:

Doctors set his recovery time at 6-12 weeks. He spent 15 days in the hospital post-op.

Howard told assistant coach Howard Eisley, a lifelong friend, that he would return in two weeks. He saw doctors’ recommendations as races to win, not timelines to live by. And he suffered for it.

“I thought I was a Marvel hero, but this was real life stuff I was dealing with, and I was extremely naive,” he says. “I was impatient with the process.”

Howard wasn’t fully recovered when he returned to the Michigan bench for a November trip to the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas, he says. Multiple complications emerged throughout the season. He rarely slept through the night. Doctors advised him to step away and undergo another surgery to address an atrial flutter that sapped his energy and caused severe discomfort. He was scheduled to undergo a 7 a.m. procedure following a Jan. 23 road game at Purdue, but heavy snow grounded Michigan’s return flight. Howard’s surgery was canceled and he declined to reschedule it in-season, against doctors’ recommendations and to Jenine’s displeasure.

The surgery is scheduled for April 19.

There is a timeline where Howard does not get Terrence Shannon and Caleb Love spiked into the earth by admissions (and Shannon, uh, settles down with a nice poli sci major in Ann Arbor); a timeline where he does not have health issues. He likely still has his job, and Michigan might have been really good through year five. That is not this timeline, but it is so close that it hurts. Howard's issues were only half of his own making.

[After THE JUMP: basketball roster stuff, hockey items]

Basketball roster stuff, but smaller. The rumored hire of Akeem Miskdeen went from rumored to reported; he has not been officially announced due to Michigan's longstanding Have You Ever Been A Vacuum Refurbisher extreme background check policy, but it's just a matter of time. He's in.

Will Tschetter is in.

Terrance Williams hit the portal. (Folks: you do not have to acknowledge that everyone is technically also entering a draft they have a 0% chance to get picked in.) I was never as down on Williams as the burn-it-all-down wing of the fanbase was, but… I mean… it's fine. Good luck to him wherever he lands. Here is where I will speculate that this opens up the Eric Dailey slot.

FAU transfer Nick Boyd released a long list that did not have Michigan on it. I'm a little surprised at that; you'd think that if Michigan threw its hat in the ring they'd at least make the long list, and Boyd is a career 37% shooter from deep who had a couple of solid years as an ~average usage 20 MPG player for May. I'm slightly more surprised because the list has Texas and Louisville and a bunch of other high-majors on it. I know I said that it was less clear he was a high-major uptransfer, but I'm just a guy. If a fair swathe of the P5 is after the guy and Michigan isn't, I will register surprise. May aiming higher?

Speaking of Louisville: there was a brief surge of optimism from Card fans about landing Johnell Davis after On3's Pete Nakos posted that "Louisville isn't going down without a fight" as they attempt to fix their broken program by dumping NIL money on one-and-done players. (Did that work the last time?)

One catch: FAU played Charleston this year and it appears that FAU players loathe Pat Kelsey, the former Charleston and current Louisville coach. Owl Brandon Weatherspoon:

Made them slick comments about me early in the year but now you trying to recruit my teammates we gone see how far you get with it #GOODLUCK

— Brandon Weatherspoon (@__bloading__) April 4, 2024

Davis liked this tweet.

The issue was due to some dust-ups during the game itself, one of which set off Kelsey. A Louisville fan found the incident; unfortunately he decided that narrating some brain-dead takes over the incident was better than just letting it stand as is:

I’d like to point out that May and Kelsey seem to have squashed it all at mid court, at least on the surface. But Weatherspoon still in his feelings about something he clearly initiated is soft as hell. Also, the unwritten rule is there’s no need to smack talk a coach ya goober. pic.twitter.com/HuoflMFhDH

— ⚜️Alan Thomas⚜️ (@CardN_AL) April 4, 2024

These things were compounded when Kelsey—supposedly the adult in this situation—took to Twitter some time later to re-hash the whole thing, implying that the issue Weatherspoon had was that he was on the court. All basketball coaches who wander onto the court during play should be dragon-punched out of the arena, so we are team Weatherspoon all the way.

One thing this incident makes clear is that both programs got coaches that fit them.

Man I hope PK wins here.

Easy to root for somebody as insane about bball as the fans. https://t.co/N2uxTnCkJj

— BaxleyRJR (@BaxleyRJR) April 4, 2024

Anyway: Davis probably isn't going to Louisville. This feels like Nakos getting some dubious intel from the UL side of things, because the worst case scenario for them is message board guys saying stuff like "he was always going to Michigan but this shows we're serious." The tweet escapade rather blew up in his face.

Rising. JJ McCarthy goes fourth in Bruce Feldman's latest mock draft:

“I think too many people are getting caught up trying to look at box scores instead of watching film. He makes a lot of plays for them after the play breaks down. There’s some ‘wow’ stuff in there. He’s on a dead sprint, and he makes some perfect throws. When he has to get out and make a play, he can really do it.”

“We thought he throws a little bit of a flat ball and you wouldn’t see much of him layering it in there. But he’s really dynamic. You wanted to keep him in the pocket but he’d still get out whenever they needed him to, and he’s great throwing on the run. He could get out to his left or his right and get you, but especially going to his right.”

No other Michigan players in the first round.

Praise Tiny Jesus. Seamus Casey will be available for the Frozen Four:

Brandon Naurato on the likelihood that standout defenseman Seamus Casey will play for Michigan in the Frozen Four: “100 percent.” pic.twitter.com/vEWYTt6KRD

— Clayton Sayfie (@CSayf23) April 3, 2024

Michigan needs all hands on deck against BC.

I'll believe it when I see it. This has never happened:

Pat Micheletti said on a podcast Saturday morning that he thought snuggy would be back. He also said that he'd heard basically every Michigan player that isn't graduating is expected to return next season. If that holds up the B1G is going to be straight fire next year

— A-P (@adampieski) April 2, 2024

Micheletti is a Minnnesota radio guy who is a Gopher legend, for context. My reaction to this is always "I don't believe you," but Michigan has a couple of reasons to hope. One is that the New Jersey Devils have a loaded blueline and aren't projected to need anyone in the league next year; another is that Gavin Brindley won't turn 20 until October and is the kind of undersized forward that NHL teams sometimes leave be.

If, hypothetically, Michigan does get their top line back (or even two of the three) they will be unfathomably loaded at forward next year. The only forward without eligibility next year is Chase Pletzke. They have the top two scorers in the USHL committed—and these are draft-year guys, not overagers. They also have NTDP F Christian Humphreys, who's likely to be a second or third rounder, coming in. They'd have to put off a couple of guys who look likely to be quality college players. 

It's not happening! Why did I even write this?

Speaking of. USHL scorer #2 is Chicago Steel center Michael Hage, who had an unbelievably rough year:

In Hage’s first practice with the Steel a year and a half ago, he blew out his shoulder — which had bothered him throughout the previous summer — and had to undergo surgery.

The surgery cost him his first year of junior hockey in the USHL as a 16-year-old. He left the team briefly that fall to begin his rehab at home with his family, but made the decision to return after Christmas and worked for months to get back before the end of the year.

Last April, then-assistant general manager Noelle Needham said she believed that had he not gotten hurt, he would have been right behind Macklin Celebrini at the top of the 2024 class entering his draft year.

“And he’ll get back there,” she insisted. “He’ll be fine. He’s going to be the real deal. But just given what he has also sacrificed, I mean he could have stayed at home but he (was) in Chicago the whole time skating, conditioning, lifting, watching film, traveling with the team, watching in the stands.”

Eventually, he returned, playing in the Steel’s final 13 games of the season and registering 10 points.

A couple of months later, over that weekend last July, he lost his dad.

Hage's father died in a swimming pool accident; Hage had to go through rehab with a heavy weight. Will be an easy guy to root for.

Etc.: NIL has blown up the shoe company monopoly on paying basketball players. Two WBB commits starred in the McDAA game. Law-talkin' about NCAA NIL lawsuits. OSU player enters NBA draft while retaining "eliginility." Stupid typo… or BRILLIANT TYPO? TV ratings should prevent Greg Sankey from obliterating the tournament. New kickoffs en route? How Davis ended up at FAU.