photo by: Damon Young/Kansas Athletics

Kansas women's basketball signee Jaliya Davis poses for a photo at the Jayhawks' game against Penn State on Sunday, Dec. 15, 2024, in Lawrence.

When the new members of the Kansas women’s basketball team were trying on their new gear, head coach Brandon Schneider heard one of them say, “It’s finally great to see my name on the back of the jersey.”

Incoming freshman Jaliya Davis, an Overland Park native who starred at Blue Valley North High School, was eager to affirm when she spoke to reporters on Tuesday that she was in fact the player in question.

“I’ve been dreaming about this moment since I was a little kid,” Davis added. “I came to games since I was really small, and it’s just really cool to represent my home state.”

In return, she represents a bright future for the KU program.

Not only is she following in the footsteps of current star junior S’Mya Nichols, a guard from Shawnee Mission West who two years ago decided to stay in-state, she is also the highest-ranked recruit signed by the Jayhawks since ESPN began its women’s rankings in 2007 and just the second McDonald’s All-American the KU women’s program has ever brought in out of high school.

“I’m super excited,” Davis said. “Kansas was one of my first offers, so I was able to build a really good connection with the coaching staff and the team. And I’m just super excited to get on the court with new teammates.”

The 6-foot-2 forward, ESPN’s No. 19 prospect, is essentially the prize of a monumental recruiting class that also includes guards Keeley Parks (No. 31) and Libby Fandel (No. 43) and four-star forward Tatyonna Brown. Nichols, for comparison, was No. 34 in the class of 2023.

Davis said she grew up watching Nichols play for the Missouri Phenom AAU team and sees her as a “really good role model.” Nichols is clearly embracing that sort of responsibility as, in a story Schneider relayed, she told her coach she didn’t want to live off campus because she wanted to be on campus for the freshmen’s sake.

In any case, Schneider believes this new pattern of reeling in top local prospects can serve KU well going forward.

“We’ve got some really, really good players in the ’26 class and the ’27 class that are 25 to 40 minutes from campus that have strong ties to KU,” Schneider said. “I really think that S’Mya impacted the subsequent classes and I hope that a player like Jaliya will do the same in those classes.”

In the interim, on the court, both Schneider and Davis expect her to be an immediate contributor: “I think she saw opportunity to come in and play right away,” Schneider said, “and I think she’s excited for that kind of challenge.”

“I’m hoping that I can come out with a bang,” Davis added. “But I think I’ll be good. I’m expecting that I’ll be able to work through whatever comes at me and just kind of grow as a person.”

As KU shifts to more of a two-forward system after playing four guards around a center in recent years, Davis can be one prominent source of physicality inside.

“She is a dominant rebounder and a matchup issue on the offensive end,” Schneider said in a press release announcing Davis’ signing back in November. “She can post, she can attack off the bounce and she can stretch it to the three-point line. Her versatility carries over to the defensive end as her quickness will allow her to guard multiple positions at our level.”

Davis is one of three KU freshmen who were named last season’s Gatorade players of the year in their respective states and was the co-winner of the DiRenna Award for the best girls basketball player in the Kansas City area. She is Blue Valley North’s all-time leading scorer and helped the team win a state title as a senior, when she averaged 25.0 points, 7.5 rebounds, 2.3 steals and 2.1 assists per game.

photo by: McDonald’s All-American Game

East’s Jaliya Davis pushes toward the basket in the McDonald’s All-American Game on Tuesday, April 1, 2025, in Brooklyn, N.Y.