It didn’t take Michigan basketball coach Juwan Howard long to start building relationships after he was hired in May 2019.
Those relationships didn’t stop at the American border. The first-time head coach, who hasn’t shied away from recruiting blue-chip talent so far, began regularly conversing with German prospect Franz Wagner over FaceTime. At the time, Wagner had recently visited Ann Arbor in the wake of former coach John Beilein’s abrupt departure for the NBA — a bizarre official visit that came nearly two weeks before Howard agreed to a five-year deal to coach the Wolverines.
But Howard kept at it.