Thoughts on Michigan's New Basketball Coach

I'm back and I'll give my thoughts on the men's basketball tournament tomorrow. Today I want to talk about the new Michigan men's basketball head coach.

Michigan relieved Juwan Howard almost two weeks back, I think they should have given him one more season, and they hired Dusty May over the weekend. I guess they waited to see how Florida Atlantic, his previous team, performed in the first round of the tourney, and then they were going to get him. FAU got beat in a solid round one game, and May was suddenly very available. He was so available, that earlier on Saturday I read that he was finalizing a deal to become Louisville's next men's basketball head coach. I moved on to other names I liked for the job and sat and waited. But Saturday night something must have changed because it was reported that May had turned down the Louisville job and was going to take the Michigan job. I didn't believe it because of the Louisville stuff, but it was confirmed by multiple sources and sites and the university made it official on all of their social media. It was official. May took the job and signed the contract.

I didn't really know what to think. I still don't really know what to think. I was rooting for Shaka Smart to get the job, but who knows if he was even open to moving jobs and Marquette is still in the tournament. He still has some coaching to do. Brian Dutcher was my second choice, but his team is still playing and who knows if he wanted to return to Ann Arbor. May probably was next on my list, but that was strictly due to what I was reading online about him. I still don't know too much about him. What I do know, FAU has been to the tournament two years in a row, where before they had only been three total times in the history of being a division 1 basketball team. They were also in the Final Four last season. I know that was last year , but still, a mid major in the Final Four is pretty impressive. He also won a ton of games and developed players within the program. That is one thing I think will have to change after taking the Michigan job. The transfer portal in big business now in all of college sports. I love the idea of recruiting and developing, which he has proven he can do with way less resources. But college sports is the wild west right now, and you can get tons of hired guns through the portal. I hope he brings some kids from FAU to Michigan to help with the transition in season one under May. He has proven he can recruit. He takes two and three star guys and gives them a tried and true system and they deliver for him. He wins enough games to get to the tournament. He wins in the conference tournaments. The Big 10 is different and tough and a bloodbath, but May has proven he can hang with the bluebloods in men's college basketball.

May is also young, and I'm stoked on that. College sports is changing and you are seeing a ton of younger dudes take over big time programs. Michigan went young with Sherrone Moore to lead the football team. Alabama went young after Nick Saban retired. Duke went young after Coach K. Dan Hurley may seem old, but he is not as old as he looks. Just look at a bunch of current coaches, they are skewing much, much younger.

I have also read some things about his possible staff, and it looks young too, or if they are older dudes, they are Michigan dudes. Apparently John Beilein was instrumental in getting May to take this job, and now he is being mentioned as someone who will work closely with the basketball team, whatever that may mean.

All in all, if you read what the pundits say, this seems like a good hire. May is on the come up and he kind of had his pick of where he wanted to coach next. He has been highly successful at his previous stop and seems prepared to take this next step. It will take time. This program is a total mess and they only have four current players on scholarship. I will be watching what he does in the offseason and I hope he makes his moves sooner rather than later. I am excited, but it could just be the fact that I'm excited about something new with my favorite men's college basketball team. I'll give May two years, but results need to start coming in year 3. That is my mood going forward with this hiring. Go Blue. 

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

Follow Ty on instagram.

Michigan Wolverines Basketball is Not a Good Watch

I am still reveling in the glory of Michigan's football title. I don't think I'll ever not be happy about this past college football season. It was an amazing season, it was incredible to watch and it made me smile so much. But man oh man is the men's basketball team bad. They are really, really bad.

The Wolverines cannot put it together. I don't think they've played a full game since the first or second game of the season. They have been a team that plays tough in the first half, then they totally flop in the second half. They have blown many halftime leads, they have let close games slip away and they look confused more often than not on the floor. They seemingly have no plan on offense, their defense is horrendous and the coaching has been rough all season long.

Where we sit right now they are 8-22. They have officially clinched the bottom of the Big 10. They have been beaten seven straight times. In fact, they are 3-20 in their last 23 games, and have recently been beaten by 30 at Rutgers. Their best starter, transfer Oliver Nkamhoua, has been inconsistent and now is out for the year with an injury. Dug McDaniel, their lead point guard, got oddly suspended for road games halfway through the season. It was bizarre. There was no reasonable reason for the suspension, other than McDaniel's grades. But, why not just fully suspend him? It was odd. Another transfer, Nimari Burnett, has been on the floor with the team,  but he may be the most inconsistent player in the entire Big 10. Tarris Reed barely gets touches. He has been horrendously underutilized. Howard was a big man, so you'd think he would be coaching him up. It has been the opposite for Reed. And Terrance Williams has never gotten over the hump. He has been an offensive liability since he stepped on campus. The bench is not great either. Will Tschetter is too wild and too inconsistent of a shooter to get real playing time. Youssef Khayat has not gotten any better. Tray Jackson has never gotten into much of a flow. And George Washington Jr has gotten less and less playing time. I fear he may transfer. The team is also trying extra hard to keep their committed recruits, which is never a good sign.

The construction of this team is a mess, and the coaching has been bad. The season started with Juwan Howard out due to heart surgery. I had no idea he had anything wrong. But when the team took the floor for game one, Howard was gone. Phil Martelli filled in just fine, but he is not a head coach anymore. He is an assistant. Howard came back, but it feels like he has not had any type of real gameplan. The offense seems slapstick. They shoot too many threes, but don't attack enough. They seem to settle far too much. There is no real ball movement. The offense feels a lot like going one on one. There doesn't seem to be much of a plan. The defense is very bad. They don't rotate. They get confused too much. They are bad in transition. They give up way too many open looks. Teams move the ball with ease. They are not a good rebounding team. They don't box out and they give up on possible rebounds way too quick.

This Michigan men's team is really really bad. That starts from the top. Juwan Howard is having as bad a year as a head coach can have. He doesn't seem to be in control. It started with him getting Caleb Love to commit from the transfer portal. He committed, was ready to come to Ann Arbor and then he wasn't accepted. His grades weren't good enough from what I read. Howard went to Michigan. He should know the standards to get into the university. Then he took on Nkahouma, who is very talented. But, there has to be a reason he left a very, very good Tennessee team. I don't know if it was a lack of playing time, or something else. Seems odd though. Burnett is on his third team now, and he did not start at either Alabama or Texas Tech. Then Howard had Martelli oddly coach a game that he was healthy enough to coach. But, for some reason he asked Martelli to be the head man for one game in the middle of the year. It made no sense. Then the basketball team strength and conditioning coach just resigned. But, the whole story of why just recently came out and it paints a very bad picture of Juwan Howard. He has clear anger issues that he needs to deal with on his own time. He has had multiple issues with anger in the past, and this deal with the S&T coach leaves Howard with a very bad look. Having said all of this, I would not let Howard go just yet. This season has been bad. The team looks bad, Howard looks bad, they cannot win many games and they are going nowhere. But I'd give Howard one more season on a very, very short leash. If there is no sign of improvement within the first five games of next season, let him go then. Coaches have bad years. Sometimes it doesn't pan out the way you want it to.

This is rock bottom for the men's team. I haven't seen this team play this bad since they were sanctioned to hell after the Fab Five left. Things need to be fixed, and fixed soon. But I wouldn't let this staff go just yet. Give them one final shot at turning it around. 

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

Follow Ty on instagram.

Juwan Howard Should Be Severely Punished, Not Fired, for His Actions

The NBA all star weekend will have to wait until tomorrow. Today I have to talk about the unfortunate incident that happened at the end of the Wisconsin-Michigan basketball game yesterday.

This was a somewhat easy win for Wisconsin, with Michigan going ice cold in the second half. Wisconsin won, won with ease and put a dent into Michigan's tournament hopes. Near the end of the game Wisconsin called a timeout, up 14 points, while Michigan still had a few starters in, and they were pressing, with about 10 seconds left in the game. I feel like both head coaches made a mistake here. Michigan should not have been pressing. They were down, they had no chance to win and the starters should have been out. Wisconsin had the win in hand, they could have let the clock run and there was no need to even worry about using a pointless timeout that late in the game. None of this is against the actual rules, but it is part of the unwritten rules in the world of sports. Each coach made multiple unwritten rule mistakes.

During the handshakes at the end of the game, which I was totally happy not having last season due to COVID, Juwan Howard tried to quickly walk past Greg Gard to avoid letting his temper get the best of him. Howard was, for some reason, fuming about the late timeout. And I guess when Howard walked by Gard he said, "I will remember this shit". That was not needed. But Gard grabbed Howard, I guess to try and explain. Again, that was not needed. Things just escalated from there. When Gard grabbed at Howard and stopped him, Howard went off. He started to yell and grab at Gard and the other Wisconsin coaches. It got to the point where the players got involved. People were gathering in a big circle and yelling at one another. At one point Howard open palm slapped a Wisconsin assistant coach. Then players, pretty much all Michigan players, threw punches. Howard had to be pulled back by some of his players. Moussa Dibate and Terrance Williams threw hands. The players and coaches all moved the big circle back and forth, and things were eventually settled.

After the game each coach gave their side of the story and every single website and sports app in the world had their own personal take. I sat and stewed in it for a while. At first I just kind of forgot about it. Then I thought some more about it. Then I slept on it. And then my dad and I texted about it this morning.

I believe that there needs to be punishment handed down, and it needs to be stern. After the football offseason and this basketball incident, Warde Manuel, Michigan's AD, needs to flex his muscles. It has not been great to be a Michigan fan the past couple months, what with Harbaugh openly flirting with the NFL, the basketball team struggling and now this post game handshake incident. Howard needs to be suspended, maybe for the rest of the season, including the Big Ten tournament, and any postseason tournament they may get invited to. Howard also needs to feel the punishment in his wallet. The fine should be pretty significant. I'm thinking, at the low end, at least 20,000 dollars. My dad also brought up that maybe they should send Howard to anger management, I hadn't thought of that, but it seems like a good idea, being this is not the first time Howard has gotten physical with another coach. Whatever it may be, the punishment needs to leave a mark.

As for the people saying Howard should be fired, that is nonsense. These things do happen, and this is not even close to the worst thing that has happened on a college basketball floor. Let us not forget about Bobby Knight throwing a chair or grabbing a player by the throat. Or the time Coach K openly chastised Dillon Brooks for shooting a late 3 in a tournament game that ended Duke's season. We have all the off field stuff with Iowa football last season, and Kirk Ferentz did not even miss a game. Howard putting his hands on another coach is very, very wrong, and needs to be addressed. But there is no world in which he deserves to lose his job. He is having a rough year, he let his emotions get the best of him and he will most likely pay a heavy price. But lose his job? Come on. That is too, too far. But he does deserve a swift and painful punishment. This is also a chance for Warde Manuel to hit the reset button and show the coaches of the sports teams that they work for him, not the other way around.

Yesterday was a bad game marred with a horrible on court incident involving the head coach of the basketball team. Now we wait to see what Howard's punishment will actually be.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

What the Heck is Going On With Michigan Basketball?

I need to eat some crow today. I was super high on Michigan basketball going into the season. The women's team has been great. That one I was right on. They have looked every bit the part of a team that made the Sweet Sixteen last year and are building off that success. The men's team has not been great. What happened?

I was stoked going into this season. They were coming off an Elite Eight appearance, they were a number 1 seed and they had a wonderful group of freshmen coming in. They were a preseason top 10 team, they were picked to win the Big 10, Hunter Dickinson was a national player of the year candidate and Caleb Houstan was going to be a lottery pick. It all looked so good.

Well things have not gone as planned. They lost an early game to Seton Hall. Seton Hall is good, that game seemed like an aberration and stuff like that happens in college basketball all the time. But they struggled to put away a below .500 team after that game. It seemed like they were going to go on a run, and then Arizona demolished them. Again, Arizona was underrated at the time, but they beat the brakes off of Michigan. That game wasn't close. They also got destroyed by UNC in the Big 10/ACC challenge. UNC is also not very good. Minnesota came into Crisler, with the Wolverines riding a two game win streak, and crushed them. Then UCF crushed them. And, most recently, Rutgers got their first ever win in basketball over Michigan the other night. They play MSU tomorrow, and I am not very hopeful for that game, causing me to rethink my 2022 resolution.

This team is not good right now. They play too much individual basketball. They rely too heavily on Hunter Dickinson. Caleb Houstan has not played very well to this point. Eli Brooks can't hit the ocean. Moussa Diabate got hurt. Kobe Bufkin got COVID. Brandon Johns has regressed. Frankie Collins is too inconsistent. They just do not play as a team. They also find some way to melt down after halftime too. They have held leads, or the games have been close at the half in most. Then they get extremely cold from the field and they cannot play defense. UNC throttled Michigan in the second half of that game. Minnesota did the same. They could not stop Geo Baker against Rutgers. It has been a constant downfall in the second half all year. Even the games they won, minus a few, they have really struggled. They have been missing far too many free throws, blowing leads, falling behind by double figures, blowing defensive assignments and just letting one bad thing snowball into many bad things. It has been a struggle. They are not a top 25 team. They are not even a NCAA tournament team right now. They have a lot of work to do.

I do believe they have time to turn it around, or at least become more competitive. The game tomorrow is going to speak volumes to me going forward. Win or lose, hopefully they win, how they perform is going to shape the rest of the season. They have the talent to turn it around. Juwan Howard is an excellent coach. The players are good enough to put it together, they just have to find a way. But this is not the team I was expecting this season. I do not think it was the team they were expecting. They are bad. They have things to figure out. They have to put in more work. But they can do it. I do have hope they can turn it around. I feel like they just need to tweak a few things and put together a full game to get their confidence back. I think they may have been feeling themselves before the season, buying into the preseason hype. Well they have fallen flat on their faces. Now they can try and fix it, or just go deeper into a hole.

Hopefully they figure it out. They are no longer a top seed, a national title contender, a team to fear. But, they can maybe become a solid tournament team. Time will tell.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing and the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast.

Come and support Ty and the podcast on Patreon.

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.

I am Excited for the Juwan Howard Era at Michigan

After about 10 days, the University of Michigan men's basketball has found their new head coach, and I am cautiously optimistic.

The Wolverines hired the first of the "Fab Five" players to sign back in the day, Juwan Howard. I loved Howard when he was a player on the team. His game was so admirable, and impressionable, to me as a young player. He fought hard on the block. He worked the low post. He was an excellent rebounder. He could run the floor. He played defense and he put in work every game. He was the hardest worker on the team, and he also happened to be tremendously skilled. He was also the most mature guy on the team, even when he was a freshman. Chris Webber was the best player, Jalen Rose had the swagger, Jimmy King was an explosive athlete and Ray Jackson had that dog in him. Juwan Howard was the glue that kept them together. He was a great, great Wolverine.

Howard then went on to have a very solid NBA career, playing more than a decade, I'm sure he made at least one all star team, won a couple of titles and became a solid assistant coach for the Miami Heat. When the Michigan job opened, unexpectedly, I didn't even think of Howard until Jalen Rose said something about it on his show. Then Chris Webber said something during an NBA playoff broadcast. Reggie Miller echoed his statement that night. Then Jimmy King came out and said something. When all these people, who I respect, started to talk about him for the job, I became intrigued. I found out that he has been working with the bigs on the Heat, and that he has also been picking the brain of head coach Erik Spoelstra, who I adore, and Pat Riley. If you are going to learn coaching from any 2 guys in the NBA, I would think that Spoelstra and Riley are at, or near, the top.

By the time all this news came out, and after I did my personal research, I was on board. Then, Billy Donovan pulled his name, and I started to stump for Howard. I told my dad at my son's baseball game this past Sunday, I hope Juwan Howard gets named the new head coach no later than Wednesday. Well, that was exactly when it happened. But, as I stated at the top, I have good and not so good feelings on this hire.

Lets get the bad out of the way first. Howard has zero head coaching experience. Now, that isn't that bad, he has been an assistant in the NBA for going on 5 years now. But, he is taking over a team that was in the title game 2 years ago and started out last season with 17 straight wins. Michigan also played a very complex offense that was hard for opposing teams to figure out. Michigan will, most likely, lose many of the assistants that worked under John Beilein, mainly Luke Yaklich. He turned them into the stellar defensive team they were last year. Michigan is also losing 3 starters from last season, and their top recruit decommited when Beilein left for the Cavs job. These are my only concerns.

As far as what I am hyped about, what I love about this hire. They got a big name. While Juwan Howard may not have been a hot coaching candidate at the current moment, his time was coming. He was clearly working his way to becoming a head coach. He was putting in the grunt work. Michigan is also getting one of their greatest basketball players ever to come back and coach the team he played for. That sense of pride and want and will to win at your alma mater is humongous. He can recruit. I know he hasn't done it yet, but when he was 17, he was the one that convinced the "Fab Five" to get together. He was the first to sign his letter, and after that, he was in the ear of the other 4 guys pretty much instantly. He got them to come there even before they were given money while at the school. Everywhere Howard has been, for the most part, he has been on a winning team. I'm sure he will want that to continue. I have faith that, even if Yaklich does leave, Saddi Washington will stay, and he is a key assistant. I also think Howard will be able to lure good to great assistant coaches.

Back to the recruiting for a second. He played and coached guys like LeBron James and Dwayne Wade. They both adore him, they pushed for him to get this job and they have 2 young sons that will be college basketball players very soon. I'm sure they will want their kids to play for a coach that they know and like. Also, there are a bunch of other kids out there with parents like me who were big time fans of the "Fab Five", and they may nudge their kids to, at least, consider Michigan because of Howard's presence.

What makes me most confident in the hire, he already has a very good team in place. The transition to this next season should be smooth-ish. He has a floor general in Zaiver Simpson. He has his modern big in Jon Teske. David DeJulius was a top level recruit last year. Brandon Johns was Mr. Michigan basketball. Colin Castleton got quality time. And they have a solid class coming in, even if Jalen Wilson doesn't go back.

I'm letting myself get excited by the Juwan Howard hiring. In fact, I like this hire more than when they hired Jim Harbaugh as head football coach 5 years ago. Don't get me wrong, I liked that too, I just have a different, more excited feel for the Juwan Howard hiring. He was a great choice and I hope he has a tremendous amount of success, obviously. This has been an odd, and sometimes rough, offseason for Michigan basketball. But, the hiring if Juwan Howard eases a good amount of that fear. Now lets see how he does.

Ty

Ty is the Pop Culture editor for SeedSing, the other host of the X Millennial Man Podcast, and the greatest basketball writer on the internet. 

Follow Ty on instagram and twitter.

SeedSing is funded by a group of awesome people. Join them by donating to SeedSing.