DAYTON - The dismal results in his initial season as Dayton baseball coach weren't a surprise to Jayson King. He knew it'd be a struggle even before the first pitch.   

"It all starts with talented players, and, the first year, there just wasn't enough of them," he said.

The former Army assistant and Division-II coaching stalwart scoured the nation for difference-making recruits, dipping often into the junior-college ranks to find players who could make an instant impact.

And after giving the roster a much-needed makeover, King went about addressing the shoddy work habits and lax attitude that were all too prevalent in the program.

"We wanted to instill the competitiveness, the toughness, the attention to detail. Every coach talks about them, but talking about them and implementing them are two different things," he said.

"Last year's team wasn't the most talented team, but they did the little things well. They competed well, they showed up every day, they did the work. That brought us to where we ended up last year. Now, with more talent, if hold the line with those types of things, there's more to come."

The Flyers made significant strides in going from 21-31 in 2018 to 32-26-1 last spring — racking up their most wins since 2011 — and finished third in the Atlantic 10 at 16-8. They qualified for the seven-team league tourney for the first time in five years and reached the championship game before losing, 4-3, in 12 innings to Fordham.

With plenty of experience returning — along with several promising newcomers — UD, which begins its season against Bryant on Feb. 14 in Wilmington, N.C., has its sights set on not only making the NCAA tourney, but advancing.

"All offseason, we've been working on building on the success we had last year and building on the culture we've started to develop," senior pitcher Hunter Wolfe said. "Tying all that together — with the amount of talent we have — we should, without a doubt, be able to win the conference and make it into a regional."

Wolfe is a big reason for the optimism. After arriving last year from Wabash Valley (Ill.) Community College, he led the A-10 in wins and earned second-team all-league honors, going 9-4 with a 3.70 ERA and 85 strikeouts in 82.1 innings.

"He's so consistent and so competitive. He's someone you love seeing out there," King said. "Having him back and knowing he's anchoring that starting rotation is huge."

Behind Wolfe will be seniors Cole Pletka, who had 81 strikeouts in 56.1 innings, and R.J. Wagner, who went 5-3 with a 3.78 ERA. And the staff also has been fortified by three new signees, JC transfers Andrew Zapka and Jared Howell and grad transfer Ben Olson.

Senior designated-hitter Alex Brickman hit .264 last season and tied for the team lead in home runs with seven despite playing only 37 games because of injuries. Senior first-baseman Eddie Pursinger batted .256 with seven homers and 35 RBIs. Brickman came from St. Petersburg C.C. and Pursinger from Sinclair.

Junior third-baseman and pro prospect Ray Tirotta (.260, 5 HRs, 41 RBIs) and sophomore short stop and A-10 all-rookie team selection Benjamin Blackwell (.275) also are expected to lead the way with their bats.

The Flyers also bolstered their lineup with another key JC pickup. Mariano Ricciardi, who hit .324 with a .400 on-base percentage for Cypress (Calif.) C.C. last season, likely will be the lead-off hitter and second-baseman.

Though UD, which is receiving votes in the 2020 Collegiate Baseball preseason poll, had a modest 42 home runs in 2019, King said: "There's going to be a lot of guys who can hit the ball out of the park this year."

The Flyers hit a pedestrian .252 last season and struck out a league-high 535 times, but they were able to score at a fairly high clip (6.2 runs per game) because of aggressive base-running.

They were second in the league with 113 steals in 140 attempts. Tirotta and junior right-fielder Michael Cleary had 18 thefts, junior center-fielder Mitchell Garrity 16, Blackwell 15 and Pursinger 12. Even sophomore catcher Jay Curtis was a threat to run, getting nine steals in 10 tries.

But King said: "We're two years in, and we're still getting where we want to be in the regard. … We'd like to be more wide-open and have guys really feeling like they're trying to get to the next base."

While the players may need some prodding in that area from King, they no longer have to be sold on his vision for the program.

They understand what it takes to win, and they're hungry for more.

"What makes him so effective is he doesn't let us make any excuses," Wolfe said of King. "(The coaches) are putting in the time in the offseason to recruit good players. And now that he's built this culture, it's a lot easier to get good players as well.

"The level of competitiveness since I got here — just from talking to former players — is probably 10 times deeper than it was in the past. Position players all have to fight for their spots. There's two players who can start at every position."

Having come so close to making the NCAA tourney is all the motivation the Flyers need.

"I thought we finished last year on a down note. But in many ways, it showed how close we could get and how close the program really was, being able to achieve to that level," King said.

"I thought last year was a really good springboard for the winning culture of the program. Moving into this year with more talented players and a lot of good kids returning, everything is really positive."