Roberto Martinez hailed Saturday's 2-1 victory over West Ham as the start of Wigan's season as they claimed a first home win of the campaign to end a poor run.
The Latics had gone six games without a Barclays Premier League victory, losing four times, but goals from Ivan Ramis and James McArthur early in each half proved enough.
Latics manager Martinez said: "Before the game we knew it was a must-win game, and that's always difficult to cope with. It brings extra expectations and all of a sudden you start wanting to win and you don't really know how to win."
He went on: "I thought today was the complete opposite. I thought the performance was very mature, we kept the ball really well at times, we were a real threat and probably the most pleasing aspect was the manner we coped with their attacking threat.
"Until the last minute we showed real composure and I was extremely pleased with that. It was a very well deserved three points and now is probably the start of our season."
The Hammers had lost only twice in the league before Saturday but boss Sam Allardyce was highly critical of the performance, particularly when West Ham had the ball.
He said: "From start to finish we never got going. They hadn't won a game at home and, if you stay in the game, they get a bit more nervous.
"I'm surprised because our last away performance against QPR was outstanding and it was that performance I was asking for.
"We might have had a better start than Wigan but we've only just got here [to the Premier League] and we can only go out and give 100% to get a result. Any less than that you get punished at this level.
"Their technique was 10 times better than ours. Our technique on the ball was ridiculously poor today. The one thing that's got us where we are is our technique has been very good in possession. Today was a real blow and a real shock."
