Dug McDaniel hospitalized before MSU game; why this Michigan star stuck up for a Hoosier

It was the second game of the season when Michigan basketball's Hunter Dickinson and Eastern Michigan's Emoni Bates, a former five-star recruit, put on a show at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit.

Dickinson put up a game-high 31 points and seven rebounds, Bates scored 30 and the Wolverines held off a pesky Eagles team for an 88-83 victory. But they wouldn't have done so if it wasn't for another co-captain, Terrance Williams II.

The junior had the best game of his Michigan tenure, putting up 18 points (second-highest of his U-M career) and grabbing a career-best 11 rebounds. But since that night, things haven't come so easily.

In the past 13 games, Williams hasn't scored more than 11 points (which he's done three times) in a game and has grabbed double-digit rebounds just once (he had 11 in a loss to North Carolina). Just once this season — a 4-for-7 effort against Maryland on Jan. 1 — has he shot better than 50% when attempting at least four field goals.

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"I think the biggest thing for him is staying aggressive," Dickinson said Wednesday. "That’s the thing that everybody on the team wants to see from him: Continue to be aggressive because we all know what he’s capable of.

"Even if the shots aren’t falling, just continue to be aggressive. Once you lose confidence in yourself, then everything goes downhill from there. … Everybody believes in him, but it’s hard to stay confident when your shot's not falling."

Perhaps nobody was asked to elevate their role on the team more than Williams this season. After playing as a rotational stretch-four last season alongside Moussa Diabate and Brandon Johns Jr., Williams is now the primary power forward, with Jace Howard and Will Tschetter rotating behind him.

However, as his playing time has nearly doubled — from 15.1 minutes to 29.3 minutes per night — his efficiency has dropped significantly.

His field goal percentage has dipped more than eight points (from 45.5% to 37.1%). After leading the team in 3-point shooting a season ago, his percentage beyond the arc has dropped by nine points (38.5% to 29.5%). And although he's getting to the line twice as often as a season ago, his free throw shooting has fallen by more than 10 points (78.8% to 68.6%).

Through 15 games, he's averaging 7.3 points and 6.7 rebounds, but has the lowest shooting percentage of any rotational player.

Williams hasn't allowed it to affect his work on the glass, though; he's the second-best rebounder on the team. The Wolverines are glad it hasn't affected his motor and they believe the best is yet to come for Williams.

"He’s been in a position the last two years where he wasn’t asked to do a lot of scoring, but I think this year we obviously see we need some scoring from him," Dickinson said Wednesday. "We just want him to come out there and start the game aggressive.

"It’s why you’ve seen him shoot a couple more threes the past couple games; we need him to take more shots and teams to respect him in game. Obviously, he’s really talented, so we just want him to go out there and show it."

McDaniel hospitalized ahead of MSU game

Michigan guard Kobe Bufkin said Dug McDaniel was under the weather before the Michigan State game. He said he didn't want to make an excuse, but then cracked a smile and said, "But it is an excuse."

Few outside the Wolverines program knew just how serious McDaniel's sickness was until the freshman point guard detailed Wednesday that he'd been away from the team for more than 72 hours.

"The days leading up to that game, I came down with a sickness, had to go to the hospital because I didn't have enough fluid in my body," McDaniel said. "I was very dehydrated, I didn't practice for three days, so that was tough.

"I was in the hospital the morning of (the game), I came the same day."

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The Wolverines looked disjoined on offense that afternoon and McDaniel struggled as much as he has in any of his first 15 games: no points on 0-of-4 shooting with four rebounds and four assists.

To add insult to injury, the freshman picked up his second foul of the game with just less than 10 minutes to play in the first half and had to sit the remainder of the period; Michigan eventually lost, 59-53, to snap a three-game conference winning streak.

"I thank my guys for believing in me, they didn't tell me to sit one (out) ... when I showed up in the conference room, the film room, they all clapped it up we had a good rejoining and so it was very great," McDaniel said of the support. "But that game showed our toughness, we come in there, we're not at 100% and we can still compete at a very high level."

As for his latest health update, McDaniel said, "I'm good now."

Dickinson defends fellow star Big Ten big man

While Dickinson and Indiana big man Trayce Jackson-Davis are enemies on the court, they team up in some ways, too. Dickinson knows the pressure that comes with starring in the Big Ten, which is why he didn't take too kindly to a letter Jackson-Davis received recently.

Indiana's big man posted it on social media; it detailed how he and his teammates are all "soft," and that he is a "horrible leader." Dickinson said he's all too familiar with that sort of message.

"I think I get a couple of those a day at this point," Dickinson said. "I will say that's one positive that nobody can take away from my podcast. I've been able to handle, I guess, hate mail a lot better. I don't really look at comments anymore on Twitter, so that's one positive for sure.

"Those are pretty common for me, especially after Saturday's game... I assume Trayce gets those a lot (too) and I could see why that one was the tipping point for him because some people can only withstand so much before they reach a breaking point."

Jackson-Davis' social media post read, in part, "You wonder why players experience mental health issues and problems," and continued that Indiana will continue to get "better as a team." Dickinson said it's easy to say athletes shouldn't respond or "be the bigger man" but added it's hard to do so when you're getting attacked every day.

"(It's hard with) how stupid people can be and how stupid Twitter is and stuff like that," Dickinson said. "People can literally make an account in a second and say something they'll never have to own up to.

"They can say the wildest, most crazy things and so, it's really hard because somebody attacks you personally, it's hard for you to not want to react. But that's the life we live as athletes who are always in the spotlight."

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan basketball's Dug McDaniel hospitalized before MSU game