Juwan Howard had one of his most interesting press conferences of the season after Michigan defeated Southern Utah Saturday night, going deep on the team's current mentality in practice and how that carried into the game, what Michigan did better defensively, what led to DeVante' Jones' and Hunter Dickinson's big games, and more. For everything Howard said, read on.

On his former NBA colleagues that were at the game (Tracy McGrady, etc.)

Man, I can't stop smiling just to see the support. The support was real tonight. It was beautiful to see coach Spoelstra come out, coach Quinnie (Chris Quinn), also coach O (Octavio De La Grana), Duncan Robinson and all the Miami Heat people that touched me and had an impact on my life and impact on coaching.

And also to see one of my favorite teammates, Tracy McGrady, in the building. Flew here from Texas and flying back home tonight to be here to support, and it was awesome, bro. The best of it all was those guys spoke to the players and talked about--I'm not going to go into details of everything they spoke about, but the brotherhood. The brotherhood is real.

On having his former boss right behind him and whether he was thinking about that while coaching

I wasn't thinking about it, but obviously I saw him. I was so locked in and engaged in the game, but it was great just to know that support was in the building and to take away from his time and know that he has to prep for an important game tomorrow versus the Detroit Pistons, it just shows that he's so selfless in so many ways and so supportive, obviously, and what he's done to help me in coaching has been special.

On DeVante' Jones having one of his best games and what he saw from him

Well, I saw a guy that was not overthinking it. Was able to take advantage of what the defense gave him. There were times when they went under on screens and he didn't second-guess himself. He'd just stand in there and took his shot and its' something that we've always talked about no matter what, make or miss. He also did a really good job of getting to the basket and touching the paint and making plays for others or also finishing. You know, he came out with a burst that was pretty special and we're going to need that burst throughout the year.

On DeVante' saying he thought he would struggle with the transition at the start of the year and how Juwan thinks he's handled it so far

I think he's been extremely...I would say very reserved in some ways. Also he's accepted the coaching and the teaching that's been delivered his way from either myself or coach Eisley and others. He's also taken leadership at time when he's made mistakes, like his teammates have. He's never deflected or pointed the finger or made excuses and I respect a guy like that. Like I've always said, and I think I told you guys this, I'm in the trenches with him and I support him and I'm always gonna support him because he's one of us. He's part of our family.

On Hunter Dickinson playing as efficiently as he did and what he thought about how he carved out space the types of feeds he was getting

Well, you know, Hunter is--nothing I haven't seen before. He got the ball in spots where he was able to be finishing by making quick moves. He also was aggressive, too, whether it was spinning to the basket to finish over top of defenders or when he caught the ball in the low post by staying low and taking his time. He also shot jumpers when it was given to him. It was a great balanced game for Hunter.

On Frankie Collins mentioning that it was one of their best weeks of practice last week and whether he saw any carryover into the game

Yes, I've seen a carryover for sure. It's not just the drills, it's just been like their attitude. They came Monday, they came with a lot of energy and they were razor sharp with their focus. No one came with their head down. Everyone was eyes open, ears perking, was ready for 'Hey, let's fix it' and whatever we need to do to get back to the habits that we've been working on because no one felt good after the Saturday loss. As a coach, when you see your team come in and respond the way they did in practice on Monday but then also consistently brought it again on Tuesday and we had a day off on Wednesday and same goals for Thursday and Friday. That's the Michigan team I know, and we're going to need that.

But there are times when if you do get a loss--but I like that way how I can trust that our guys have the attitude to come in and want to get to work and see how we can get better together, collectively. And I have that same attitude, too. They know I'm all about that. I'm not the coach that's gonna come in screaming all the time. I'm not the coach that's gonna be yelling and pointing fingers, but I'm always going to be the first to look myself in the mirror and see how I can improve, too.

On disappointment on the defensive end in weeks previous and what he saw improve tonight

Yeah, I saw individual defense, guarding the man one-on-one and not allowing to get to a spot and break us down. I also saw where the other four guys were there in their shrink position ready to help if a guy happened to get broken down off the dribble. I also saw where a team didn't allow too many paint touches to their opponents and every shot that was taken was contested, pretty much. And that's how we have to defend. This is a college basketball where, in my opinion, the Big Ten is one of the toughest conferences and we're gonna need that. We're gonna need that throughout the Big Ten season.

We're also gonna need that versus our nonconference opponents because pretty much every nonconference opponent we've faced has been an older group where older I'm speaking of is juniors and seniors or redshirt seniors, and with that, the comes with experience and we're not making any excuses, we're learning as we go but important for us is we've got to stick to being able to perform the details consistently on a night-to-night basis.

On how he felt about the team's turnovers tonight

Yeah, in the first half I looked at the turnovers and I was like, 'Wow, you know what, that's still too high' but then after the game I saw that we had 11 turnovers and I've always said our goal was 11 or less, and so we got to our goal, 11. If we can stay consistent with that that means we're not gifting our opponents too many extra possessions. Our defensive numbers look very solid.

Offensively, yes, we would like to get our three-point percentage higher but it's growing. Two-point field goal percentage is pretty good but it always gets back to we've got to cut out the offensive rebounds and turnovers, because that's where the extra gifts is happening from there.

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