What may help Darren Treasure live up to his name with the Division II game-environment initiative is his research that connects game environment to performance.

The research examines whether the environment a coach creates affects achievement strategies, work ethic, decision-making, and other variables that are important to a coach in terms of performance.

For example, Treasure said a coach who creates an “autonomy supported” environment, which gives student-athletes plenty of choices and an opportunity to be more engaged in what they’re doing on a daily basis, may get more performance return on the investment.

“Such a model stresses personal improvement as opposed to social comparative and norm-based evaluation,” he said. “In other words, we’re trying to find out how to get an athlete from here to there rather than how to get an athlete to beat another athlete. The environment the coach creates is related positively to more adaptive achievement behaviors.”

Treasure said he tells his collegiate-coach clients that the goal is to have student-athletes make good choices and behave in a certain way — on the field and off.

“If they don’t take shortcuts and they do make good choices off the field, that will be reflective in their approach to athletics,” he said. “Coaches are familiar with creating an environment that will prompt desired behaviors, but in the sense of game environment, if you assume that the coach is part of the game environment, then that’s how it connects with performance.”

It also may connect to the stands. Treasure said if the players behave a certain way, then it is not unreasonable to expect the fans to follow suit.

“If you don’t have kids showing up their opponents or doing silly dances after an average play, then you are more likely to have fans that act similarly,” he said.