By Andy Walter

PITTSBURGH — When the season started, it was hard to know what to make of Jyare Davis.

Sure, the 6-foot-7 forward had been a standout at Sanford.

But Davis had also been away from basketball for a while after he suffered a concussion in his one year at Providence.

After he transferred to Delaware, the newcomer scored in double figures just once in his first 17 games. Nine times in that stretch, he didn’t score more than four.

All of which makes it even more remarkable that, when the Blue Hens’ season ended with an 80-60 loss to Villanova in the first round of the NCAA Tournament on Friday, Davis was arguably their best player.

And Davis would like to think there’s more good things to come.

“I’m extremely excited (about the future),” Davis said after the game. “When I came back here to Delaware, I said I wanted to help do something special for the state of Delaware, for the University of Delaware.

“I think we’re really just getting started here. I hope I can do more to help raise Delaware, put us all on the map and come back here next year and win some games.”

With Davis as the centerpiece of a core group of younger players that also includes Andrew Carr and Jameer Nelson Jr., there’s some good reasons to believe Davis.

Davis and Carr, in particular, looked like playing in front of 18,000 people against the No. 6 team in the country wasn’t too big a stage for them. The two youngsters combined to sink 12-of-15 shots from the floor and 5-of-6 free throws in netting 30 of Delaware’s 60 points.

For Davis, who was named both the CAA Rookie of the Year and CAA tournament MVP, it was his 14th straight game in double digits.

“A lot of people go out there in that type of situation, the lights are big,” said senior guard Ryan Allen. “They both were ready for the moment. That’s just going to prepare them for the next time they’re here.”

While Friday’s game marked the Hens’ sixth NCAA tourney appearance since 1992, it was their first since 2014.

The only trouble is that the NCAA’s transfer portal throws at least some doubt over every midmajor program’s off-season. The Hens have seen a handful of their top players come and go in the past few seasons — just like most teams.

Consider that Justyn Mutts (a starter at ACC champion Virginia Tech), Ithiel Horton (a starter at Pitt) and Nate Darling (who’s played a few NBA games), all still could have been playing for Delaware this season.

Keeping a college roster together from one year to the next is hardly simple any more.

But Allen said he’s confident this nucleus will be back with the Hens and back in the NCAAs.

“I know they’ll be back here,” he said on Friday. “They’re young guys that have got two or three years left. This definitely isn’t going to be their one and only time here.

“We had a lot of seniors but I think, all together, we had a really young team. It’s going to be something to see who steps up into those roles.”

It’s coach Martin Ingelsby’s job now to keep building Delaware’s roster.

In this day and age, coaches have to keep recruiting players that are already on their rosters. Right now, the Hens have two incoming high school recruits and two more scholarships to give out.

Of course, the transfer portal is also a two-way street.

“We love our team that’s coming back, as of today,” Ingelsby said after leaving his postgame press conference. “I think we have so much to be able to build around with the core group of guys. It really, really excites me.

“What else can we add to the mix? This will be an important spring for us to kind of see what’s out there in the transfer portal. I love it here. It’s been a great run for our group.

“We’ve raised the bar, we put this program back on the map. Now we’ve got to try to keep it an elite level.”

Playing on TV in both the CAA tourney and NCAAs never hurts in selling the program, either.

Only time will tell if there’s more trips to the Big Dance in Delaware’s immediate future.

“I really do hope they stay together,” said senior guard Kevin Anderson, “because even though we’re losing five guys, we still have a bunch of key guys that really didn’t get to play this year and are really, really good.

“I feel like if they stay together, they can make an even deeper run than we did this year.”

Follow Andy Walter on Twitter at @DSNSports.