Big Ten point guard power rankings: Ace Baldwin/Braden Smith drop double-digit dimes

Dug McDaniel is the most interesting point guard in the Big Ten. The sophomore finished last season on a heater, averaging 13.8 points a game across Michigan’s last eight. Now, he has just eight games left of his season. 

Juwan Howard recently announced that McDaniel would not travel with the team to road games, but he would be available to play at the Crisler Center in Ann Arbor. That dramatically shortens McDaniel’s promising sophomore season and impacts Michigan’s outlook the rest of the way. 

McDaniel is sixth in the Big Ten in scoring and averages 5.0 assists a night while shooting 79.0% from the free-throw line. He seems like the ideal reliable point guard, though undersized at just 5-foot-11, but he’s a bit too sporadic to be trusted. I mean, his head coach can’t even trust him to travel to Champaign, Illinois or Iowa City, Iowa because he failed to meet academic goals. 

On the floor, McDaniel just led Michigan past Ohio State on Monday to snap a five-game losing streak. He had 15 points and four assists, but turned the ball over three times and only shot 6-16 from the field. McDaniel has the talent to be in the top three on this list, but he needs to mature on and off the floor to be trusted to lead the Wolverines.