Jett Howard makes solid impression on Michigan Basketball trip

One of the most promising developments on the trip to Europe for the Michigan basketball team was the performance of Jett Howard.

Even though he’s a true freshman, Jett Howard is one of the most important players on the Michigan basketball roster for the 2022-23 season.

Howard was ranked as the No. 45 overall prospect in the 2022 recruiting class according to the 247 sports composite rankings. He’s listed at 6-foot-7 and one of his best attributes has always been his shooting ability, especially from deep.

Shooting has been a concern for the Wovlerines all offseason. Not only did last season’s team not have enough shooting as we saw in the NCAA Tournament, but Michigan basketball also lost Caleb Houstan to the NBA draft.

Howard as a replacement for Caleb Houstan

Houstan didn’t play all that well last season but he was still Michigan’s best shooter. Joey Baker was an important addition and he’s a proven shooter too but the Wolverines are going to need Howard to be their volume 3-point shooter and he looked up to the task in Europe.

We only saw two full games for the Wolverines due to some electrical issues. But in the two exhibitions that Michigan basketball did play, Howard made 6-of-13 shots from beyond the arc.

The only issue with Howard’s play is that he got just one rebound. He only got to the free throw line once and went 4-for-8 on 2-pointers.

We didn’t get to watch the games in Europe so it’s hard to know exactly what happened but Howard will need to do more than just make 3-pointers to stay on the floor, but I’m not really that worried about it.

There’s always an adjustment going from high school to college but Howard has played against elite competition throughout high school and I have no doubt he’ll make an impact.

I thought that he should have been ranked as a five-star prospect. Here’s a breakdown of his play from Dylan Burkhardt of UMHoops.com:

"“Jett’s ability to space the floor is crucial to Michigan’s success in 2022-23, but his ability to impact the game in other ways is going to be what determines his ceiling. He still has a long way to go to make that multi-faceted impact, but that doesn’t mean he can’t be a useful player from day one. Jett has a scoring package that’s unique to the roster with his ability to pull up off the dribble, handle in small spaces and simply take and make shots from all over the floor. The box scores reiterate that Howard should be one of the higher usage offensive options other than Llewellyn and Dickinson and that he should be the odds-on favorite to start the season on the wing.”"

It seemed pretty clear that Howard was going to start. Hunter Dickinson is the focal point for the offense but the Wolverines are going to need to surround him with shooters and so far Howard looks like he’s ready to play that role.

Michigan was playing against professional teams and while some of the competition wasn’t top-notch, it was still surely a step above high school and Howard shot 46 percent, which bodes well for the 2022-23 season.