Northwestern Basketball: What does the future look like at point guard?

Where do things stand with guards currently on the roster?

As the roster stands now, there are three players who could feasibly see minutes at the point guard next season. Although none of them are true point guards in the sense of today’s game, they might just have to do for this upcoming season.

The most likely candidate to hold down the primary playmaking role is senior Jordan Ash. In three years with the program, Ash has started just four games and never played more than 15 minutes per game in a season. This does not bode tremendously well for him to a full-time starter in his final season but maybe he can surprise some people. For his career, he holds a 2-to-1 assist-to-turnover ratio, which is solid, but only averages 2.3 assists per 40 minutes. In addition, his career 31.3% shooting from deep (64 total attempts) does not jump off of the page.

Next up is grad transfer Ryan Taylor, who is coming from Evansville. After averaging 21.3 points per game last season playing in a solid conference (Missouri Valley), expectations are high for Taylor. He will be asked to supply a lot of scoring to help make up for the losses of McIntosh and Scottie Lindsey. However, he is better suited as an off-ball scorer. In 32.0 minutes per game over the last three seasons, the 6’5″ guard has only dished out 1.3 assists per game.

Lastly, sophomore Anthony Gaines could also see time at the point. Gaines chipped in a solid freshman campaign last season but is far from a pure point guard. He averaged just 2.5 assists per 40 minutes last season while exhibiting a 1.28 assist-to-turnover ratio. Similar to Ash, he is also not a good 3-point shooter (24.2% on 33 attempts), a skill that is often necessary for a starting guard.