Howard Coaching Eval

I appreciate what you're saying! Out of respectful discussion -

You still have to coach these players to play together, and college coaches are very active in game/ practice. In my opinion, I think he should absolutely get credit for what he did last year!

Lastly, do you think it might be a little harsh to say Houstan is a miss? He's so young, I would think it's unfair to compare to AA types, no matter the ranking.

Yeah, I remember even during the lead-up to the year thinking this site (and others) were a bit optimistic that UM would replace a bunch of NBA-level upperclassmen with true freshmen and an up-transfer PG and not miss a beat.  

Honestly, not having Austin Davis turned out to be a big loss because he's a second-unit scorer this team lacks.  And yeah, Houstan just isn't a one-and-done player; it happens.  If he comes back I think a year in a college weight program will help his physical development and, you hope, unlock the shooting that is there.  But they have flaws and they've also had some bad luck in terms of shooting (at one point teams had shot 13/14 from 3 in the past 2 games, which isn't even a sustainable percentage if nobody was guarding a team), and throw that in with a less talented team than you expect and you get this year. 

"... a lot of core Beilein guys ..."

Gulogulo37, I generally like your posts, but this "Beilein guys" shit is driving me crazy.

Could you or someone else explain how Beilein affected the play of these guys last year?

• Franz Wagner (He didn't spend a minute with Beilein and is most certainly not a "Beilein guy.")
• Hunter Dickinson
• Chaundee Brown
• Mike Smith

That's a huge chunk of the team. I'll give you Livers. I *may* give you Davis, but he improved under Howard after being a non-factor under Beilein.

Other "Beilein guys" Brooks and Johns are still here.

Juwan helped develop Austin Davis into a much better player and I think that's notable. So we know player development is there.

In what way did last years team feature a core of Beilein guys? Franz literally never received a second of coaching by Beilein. Of the top 7 guys Dickinson, Franz, Brown, and Smith were literally only ever coached by Howard. Obviously Livers and Brooks were important players but get the fuck out of here giving credit to last year to Beilein.

“I’d include Franz in that”— why?  Howard was the coach he committed to and the one who coach him.  That makes no sense.

1. It isn't a good product to watch right now.

2. Michigan just implemented covid protocols to attend games. 

3. The schedule is terrible for attending games this year IMO

It is by now an established pathology, a kind of mental illness. Anonymous noodles like this Franz Wagner type, beginning to do the exact same thing to Juwan Howard--a few games into this third season--that they did to Harbaugh.

In that case they were--with zero self-awareness--talking about a Michigan football hero, Heisman runner-up, NFL star, former over-achieving coach at two unis, who reached the Super Bowl twice and has averaged nine wins here. 

Sense of proportion, anyone? Tiniest bit of humlity or simple respect? 

In the same way--in cringe-worthy fashion--they now see fit to express ANGAR at the guy who was the centerpiece of the Fab V, played his way to an NC in college, and spent decades in the NBA, for a time as its highest-paid player, and just took OUR team to the Elite 8. Sit here at their keyboards in their jammies talking out of their behinds! It's all ludicrous, and carries a strong whiff of Covid-induced panic/exhaustion. 

Earth to mgoblog sillies: Michigan basketball owes you NOTHING. Talk about entitlement! Form up your lynch mobs elsewhere, you disgrace my school. Your anonymous herd behavior is embarrassing! 

Those teams were bereft of talent and they often suffered injuries to their best (and only good) players. This team is stuffed full of 4 and 5 star players and are completely abysmal. Juwan had a hot start his first year and then cooled off considerably as the year wore on, they were excellent all last year, and are terrible throughout this year. Whatever his true coaching acumen is, it's really hard to tell

That team finished 8-10 in a conference which produced 2 Final Four Teams and had numerous blown leads game after game in which we played Spike and Dakich major minutes.

There is little to no route to 8 wins in conference with this schedule.

Please don't compare the 38th winningest coach in ncaa basketball history and future Hall of Famer to a guy who's coaching (badly) in his 3rd year.  

Beilein's teams were a mess until he started getting point guards that could drive to the rim and be a threat to score.  It made everything else work.

We need an elite point guard.  We are Michigan, we should be able to get one.

You make good points but isn’t that on Howard to recognize that Jones absolutely could not cut it at the power 5 level? At least Mike Smith had the speed and shooting ability. Jones brings nothing to the table. 

And Brandon Johns development? Playing the PF spot for 3 years in this system and all of a sudden has dove off a mental cliff. It’s very concerning that legitimately nobody has improved outside Dickinson’s decent jump shot? 

Defense is something that can be taught better, right?  It's about discipline, understanding the opposing personnel and their game plans and sheer will/working hard.  If there was one area I thought this team could improve, it would be on defense.  It's not happening and I am looking squarely at coaching as the culprit.  Many times in the game tonight there was nobody within like 6 feet or more of the shooter.  Maybe it was a clever scheming by Rutgers to get them open but it didn't appear that way.  Our guys are getting lost on switches, miscommunications, etc.  The product I see is a far piece from any sort of decent.

If I am wrong, which I have been a lot in my life, I would like to understand why.

Jones seemed like a good pick up but was definitely billed to be more of a combo guard than a true PG.

Johns reverting to pre-Livers-injury-Johns is not necessarily Howard's fault but it's not an encouraging data point.

Houstan has been straight up disappointing but agreed that can't be on Howard.

All in all the roster just doesn't work and the 2020 class is not helping. We may have hoped the 2021 would have been more plug and play but it's not. These are reasonable transition costs to account for, but just how bad the team has been has been a bit shocking.

Let's see how things look after a few full recruiting cycles, but it goes to show how important it is to find the right combination of five guys rather than just five talented guys.

The team is really bad at passes, can never get fast breaks and has mental breakdown after mental breakdown on defense, and turnover issues. Those are all coaching things, because no matter how young or injured or lack of talent those Beileins teams may have been, they were always good passers with good ball movement. They lacked on the defensive end, but that always seemed more an athlete problem and it got better as the recruiting got better and they got better coaching on that side of the ball. 

Also it's been 3 years, the roster is more or less all Howard guys besides Eli (thank God for him), Johns and I guess Zeb, so this is what he assembled and put together. I would say it's his fault he doesn't have a PG he really likes who's not a freshman and why they have like 7 4/5s and only 4 guys who naturally a 1-3. 

He's also the guy who recruited guys who can't shoot (although I'm sure he has been shocked Houstan can't even be average for the amount of minutes he plays), so I feel like that's on him too. Basketball doesn't take as long as football for roster turnover. A dropoff because of the amount of talent loss makes sense, but these freshman have been very disappointing for the talent level.

I agree that people are way off base in worrying about Howard.  But I can’t agree that he isn’t responsible for the team sucking, simply because their defense is just really terrible.  I get that he isn’t playing the game (they defense would improve if he did), but defensive coaching is real and it’s been bad.  This team was never going to approach a team with Wagner and Brown, but they had the potential to play much better defensively than they are.  

Offensively, yeah, they are kind of stuck with a bunch of dudes who looked like they could shoot shooting like shit and Jones just can’t play point guard at this level.

Getting Beilein to be an assistant under Juwan would be almost as big of a win as beating Ohio St in football.  Pipe dream but I like to dream big.

I prefer the term "consultant".

"On paper" he's a great recruiter? I mean ... we had no McDonald's All-Americans in the past 15 years or so, and we have either 2 or 3 in this class alone? That's not "on paper" -- that's fact. If you're saying they turn out not to be so great, that's a different question. Fact is, everyone wanted them, and we got them. I'd say his recruiting is flat-out stellar, so far. It's hard to imagine what results you'd want more from recruiting than he's shown.

I personally think it's waaaay too early to make any conclusions about his coaching acumen. I don't care if this team doesn't even make the NIT, one season just isn't enough. Nobody accused Calipari or Krzyzewski of not being able to develop talent when they didn't make the tournament last year. Obviously they have a much (much) longer track record, but still, any one year just isn't enough.

(Also, we only think of last year's team as "stacked" based on how they performed last year and how many of them are now in the NBA -- but surely that has something to do with how he "utilized" the talent last year. We were absolutely not expected to win the Big Ten and get within one game of the Final Four even in the absence of our best player going into last season).

Eh. I'm not suggesting everything is great. But geez, people, sometimes teams struggle. Even Duke. Even Kentucky. Give the guy a chance to bring in a legit shooter and point guard next year. 

Franz Wagner improved in his second year. Yes, he was always talented, but most folks were quite surprised by his rise to where is is now. The “in the moment” takes are lame—the same folks who what on JB in late fall to singing his praises by March’s thaw.  

Dickinson’s shooting has improved. Zeb’s shooting seemed to have improved in the one game he played. He’s helped Eli become a more consistent shooter. Houstan is underperforming and needs to learn how to drive level ball. He settles around the arc. We have no midrange shooters outside Hunter—at least none that want to shoot from inside the arc.

They need to have Bufkin and Collins start over Eli and and Devante. Develop the future guys.  

Franz didn't develop under Howard. Nope. Not at all.

Zavier didn't develop under Howard. Nope.

Austin Davis didn't get drastically better. Nope!

Teske didn't get better under Juwan. 

Eli hasn't improved at all.

Livers never improved. 

Hunter didn't continuously improve through his freshman year and add aspects to his game this year.

You guys are right, Juwan can't develop anyone. 

Wait.  He got Frankie Collins and yet JH is a terrible PG recruiter?  He coached up Mike Smith and yet he is a terrible PG developer?  You are crazy.