After being the head coach for 24 years at St. Joseph’s in Philadelphia, new Michigan assistant coach Phil Martelli is beginning the next chapter of his career.
In an MGoBlue.com video, Martelli discussed why he joined Juwan Howard’s staff as an assistant. Martelli said he knew the next step on his coaching journey would be going to a Power Five school to a place in contention for national titles.
Michigan fit that bill for Martelli.
Howard and Martelli had not really interacted before Howard was hired in Ann Arbor. Kentucky head coach John Calipari connected the two and Martelli liked what he heard from Howard right away.
“Literally within one sentence of talking with Juwan, I said, ‘This is right. My heart has been touched and I hoped that this could come to fruition,” Martelli said in the video.
Martelli said right from the beginning, he noticed how humble Howard was, even though he has had high levels of success in the NBA.
“There’s no silver spoon,” Martelli said. “There’s no look where I’ve been. There is no I have two world championship rings. There’s no I’ve been to two Final Fours, I was an iconic college basketball team. It was a humbleness and a recognition of knowing what he didn’t know. There’s too many people who go through life faking it because they always want to be loud and boisterous.”
After talking with Howard, Martelli dug in deeper to find out just the type of person Howard was before deciding to come to Michigan.
Martelli liked what he found. “I then studied him and the fact that he graduated a year after leaving early in a time where there were not online course is absolutely stunning,” he added. “The love of family that I read in the bios that are all over the place, it just struck me as this is right.”
Martelli took his time with the process of finding his next landing spot. He wanted to be sure he was making the right decision.
“I talked to a CEO, nothing to do with sports, nothing to do with basketball, and he told me, ‘Don’t settle. Don’t rush and I’m promising your heart will be touched again,’” Martelli said. “Juwan Howard touched my heart with that phone call and I’m ok. I’m more than ok.”
Coming to Michigan, Martelli brings with him a wealth of experience running a collegiate program. He also said his mindset makes him valuable to Howard.
“I see bigger. I don’t see today being a Wednesday or today being a Thursday,” Martelli said. “I try to see bigger. I don’t know that much more about basketball than the next guy or the next guy. I know this is about people.”
Bringing his mindset to Michigan, Martelli said he is more than excited to be right where he is.
“I’m enamored by this. I’m enthralled, excited, any descriptive word you want to use, that’s exactly how I feel,” he added. “At the end of the day, people are going to judge us based on our relationships. They’re going to judge us on our relationships in recruiting, they’re going to judge us on our relationships with our players, they’re going to judge us on our relationships with former players.”
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