Juwan Howard was recently relieved of his duties as the head coach of the Michigan basketball team after a disastrous season. The Wolverines had one of the worst years in program history as they won just eight games. The results on the court weren’t there for Howard and Michigan, but there was also a lot of drama off the court. There were two instances in particular that got Howard in trouble, one with strength coach Jon Sanderson, and one after a game against Wisconsin back in 2022.
Long-time strength coach Jon Sanderson and Juwan Howard were involved in an incident back in December. Howard’s son, Jace Howard, was apparently disrespecting a trainer. Juwan recently told his side of the story, and it certainly sounds different than when Sanderson recalled what happened.
Juwan Howard’s first bad incident happened after a loss to Wisconsin in 2022. A scuffle broke out in the handshake line, and Howard ended up slapping an assistant coach on the Badgers staff, Joe Krabbenhoft.
“I will always regret how that situation happened, and I will always take full blame for it, because (I) can automatically say, ‘Oh, that wasn’t me,'” Howard said. “But, yes, it was. I could’ve controlled that and handled that situation better. That’s what I’ll always bang my head about. I had the opportunity to apologize publicly, but I also did so privately to the coaches at Wisconsin. We talked. And we moved on and got past the situation. But I can’t sit here and ask people to forget that that ever happened. I take full ownership of it.”
While it wasn’t physical, Howard was also suspended from a Big Ten Tournament game in a season before that, and he yelled “I’ll f**king kill you,” to Maryland head coach Mark Turgeon.
After these incidents, it did change the way that people viewed Howard, and he noted that it has hurt him in numerous ways.
“It hurt me in a lot of ways,” Howard added. “I know that’s part of the ‘angry Black man’ perception that’s out there. It left people with a perception that anything I do — whether it’s get a technical, which, a lot of coaches get technicals, or the situation with Jon, where you hear his side of it and his lawyer’s side of it — anything I’m involved in, it’s Juwan who started it.”
Now, Juwan Howard is no longer the coach of the Michigan basketball team. The Wolverines have moved on to Dusty May, and a new era is beginning for the Wolverines.
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