The 8-1 record first-year Michigan Wolverines basketball head coach Juwan Howard has gotten his club off to this year is tied with George Veenker (1928-29) and Steve Fisher (1989-90) for the second best nine-game debut stretch in U-M history.
The only Maize and Blue coach to post a better opening nine-contest mark was Bill Frieder in his initial campaign of 1980-81, leading his squad to a 9-0 start that year.
Frieder's club dropped its 10th game that season at Purdue, however, meaning a win at Illinois on Wednesday would improve Howard's record to 9-1, and would tie him for the best 10-game start in Michigan basketball history in the process.
Howard would be in rare company if the Maize and Blue take down the Illini this week, with only two other coaches (U-M has had 17 different head coaches all time) in the program's history having posted a 9-1 record through their first 10 games on the job — Frieder and Fisher.
Frieder's debut success in 1980-81 faded a bit as the club went on to finish with just a 19-11 record following its 9-0 start, while Fisher's early success was more prolonged.
Including the six games he coached in the 1989 NCAA Tournament, Fisher got off to a 16-1 start in his U-M career, with the only loss during that span occurring in the 1989-90 season-opener to No. 6 Arizona on a neutral court.
