George Niemann’s expertise is global, but his main focus is applying what he’s learned to Wyoming, where mental illness ripples through the population regardless of age. That’s a statement verified by the fact this state’s per-capita rate of suicide is second-highest in the nation.

Niemann applies hard science to improving performance not only in athletics but academics and lifestyle as well through his firm, A Leading Mind; the Cody resident has presented at events as prestigious as the men’s and women’s NCAA Final Four basketball tournaments.

Northwest College women’s basketball coach Cam Levett and his team are something of a pilot project for Niemann in Powell, though he’s teaching others his principles as well. Recently he made a presentation to the Cody school board.

The core of Niemann’s program is brain health — how to establish it during critical youth development years and then maintain it for life.

Properly applied, he said the strategy “will improve athletic performance, academic performance and make you a better human being.”

“This goes beyond the [basketball] court,” he told the Trapper women.

Nutrition, he said, “is vitally important” to both brain and body function.

“When your brain gets drained,” Niemann explained, turnovers, injuries and poor performance across the board will spike upward without fail.

Of equal importance is adequate sleep which, along with proper nutrition, is bound to be lacking in college students — athletes and otherwise.

“You can gain a competitive advantage tomorrow, just by paying attention to some of this stuff,” Niemann told the NWC women. “You’ve been playing since you were 4 and have developed all these bad habits.”

Happily, however, a little discipline can “revive your brain to achieve higher cognitive function,” he said, whether performing in the athletic arena or “sitting in a boardroom for a job interview.”

Belief, repetition and motivation, he said, build confidence and consistency, whether at the free throw line, in business or society.

The goal is to seek synergy “between what’s happening in the body and what’s happening in the mind,” Niemann said.

And there’s no such thing as too soon for brain health to be nurtured. At 9 months, the brain is stimulated “without the infant even knowing it,” he said. Cognitive problems in the third and fourth grades, he warned, will inevitably cause that person’s academics “to go way down” and stay there.

The No. 1 way to improve performance? Sleep.

Seven to nine hours are optimum. Less than seven or more than nine is a red flag.

“Your brain drives everything you do,” he told his audience on the NWC campus. “If you’re sleep deprived you won’t think well” and the reverse is also true: If you’re stressed from thinking too much, “you can’t sleep,” Niemann said.

After having some fun — giving animated examples of how cellphones dominate the women’s daily lives (which they did not deny) — he turned serious.

“We are overstimulating our brains” in modern society, Niemann said, which is causing a “cognitive crises across the breadth and depth of society.”

The influences upon what Niemann has presented are worldwide, but the bedrock is the book titled “The Mindful Athlete: Secrets to Pure Performance” by George Mumford, with a forward by legendary NBA coach Phil Jackson.

Northwest College will provide a copy each for Levett and his players. Niemann gave the Trappers some short-term assignments, not least of which was to thoughtfully and carefully read the book before he meets with them again after the season.

At that time, Niemann will complete some scientific analysis and coach the women up on a summer program in preparation for a return visit next fall.