Goals from Yuri Ribeiro and Lewis Grabban earned Forest a hard-fought victory over their struggling visitors and Hughton hopes that the win will help The Reds to spark their season into life.
He said: "It has been tough I must admit, especially for the players, because in terms of work-rate and endeavour I haven't been able to fault the players over the last few weeks. Tonight, getting the first goal so early settled us down and then I think we went on to play a really good game. The only shame was that we didn't increase our lead sooner as the game opened up.
"It made a massive difference to get that early goal and it changed the emotions of the game. It is a happy changing room tonight and even though we are still in the same position in the league table, it gives us something to build on and hopefully it will bring better results moving forwards.
"Irrespective of the run they are on or where they are in the table, Sheffield Wednesday have some talented individuals and they were always likely to have a strong percentage of the ball. We got to grips with our shape superbly and I have to say I am almost as happy with the clean sheet as I am with the two goals tonight.
"I think both Loic Mbe Soh and Alex Mighten did really, really well. Loic trains really well every single day and I think that allowed him to come into the side and play as superbly as he did. Alex showed a little bit of rustiness when he got into some positions but it has been a good while since he played 90 minutes and he worked tremendously hard to put in a strong overall performance.
"I didn't know too much about Cafu before I arrived at the club but he's certainly a more offensive player. He's learned a lot about the English game in a very short space of time and his strengths are getting on the ball and being creative. Now what we need to add to his game is a little bit more around the edge of the box and maybe even a few more goals.
"When you've got the ability and the goals that Lewis Grabban has, it is great to have him back. Even if he hadn't got the goal tonight, it was still great to have him back involved and to have him in the changing room again. He's a very well respected player here and I think it's a big bonus for us."