April is upon us, and only eight college basketball teams are still playing for a national championship. Eight teams have a chance to win the ultimate prize on Sunday or Monday night. For most teams, the offseason is here.

The dawn of the offseason represents an invaluable chance. While every team enters this offseason in a different place, all have an opportunity to change. And research has shown that there’s no better time to change. Katy Milkman, a behavioral economist at the Wharton School, writes about this idea in her book How to Change: “If you want to change your behavior or someone else’s,” she writes, “you’re at a huge advantage if you begin with a blank slate — a fresh start — and no old habits working against you.”

Milkman and her colleagues Hengchen Dai and Jason Riis discovered this phenomenon in a 2013 research article about fresh starts. They found that people are more likely to set goals or change behaviors at “temporal landmarks” such as the beginning of a new week, or right after a holiday or birthday – or at New Year’s, which Milkman calls the “granddaddy of all fresh starts.”

But in college basketball, January 1 is a terrible time for a fresh start. It’s the middle of the season, and routines have been implemented and tested. For those of us in the world of college hoops, right now is when we get our fresh start. It’s not really a new year on the calendar, but Milkman writes in her book that “the start of a new life chapter, no matter how small, might be able to give people the impression of a clean slate.” That’s the gift we have at this time of year — a chance to put last season in the past and start over.

There’s no wrong time to create the appearance of a fresh start — even in the middle of the season, you can change. But what’s special about the offseason is that it offers time to change. And as Milkman writes, “you’ll get further faster if you customize your strategy: isolate the weakness preventing progress, and then pounce.”

In November, it will be too late to customize your strategy. The time to do that is now. And the use of analytics is a great way to start.

For HDI and our clients, the beginning of the offseason is a critical time. Our self-scouting tools are designed to help teams identify their weaknesses and head into the offseason ready to address them. We get to work on special projects that investigate past successes and help coaches understand how to repeat them. We undertake larger-scale initiatives for the benefit of our clients, looking at teams and leagues across college basketball to find opportunities to play more efficiently. We help teams build schedules that will benefit them come Selection Sunday. And, most importantly at this time of year, our D1 and D2 player databases are providing detailed and continuously updated data and ratings on every player in college basketball (many of whom are looking for a fresh start of their own).

In her book, Milkman writes about the estimate that one third of New Year’s resolutions fail by the end of January, and 4 in 5 fail in the end. But she thinks about it differently — 20 percent succeed. “Too often, a sense that change is difficult and daunting prevents us from taking the leap to try.”

Any time is a good time to make a resolution, she writes. But in the world of college basketball, right now is the best time to take that leap.

On the wall inside the office of Oakland Golden Grizzlies coach Greg Kampe, there is a sign that reads: Adapt or die. This mindset has made Kampe the longest-tenured coach in Division 1, and this mindset earned the Golden Grizzlies a win against Kentucky in the first round of the NCAA Tournament, their first ever in the Round of 64.

Kampe has completed 40 years as the head coach at Oakland and spent many of them tracking not just total points or points per game but the more precise points per possession. Oakland’s staff has long been ahead of the curve in advancing their methods, and before the 2021-22 season, HDI began partnering with the Golden Grizzlies to deliver insights around player development, lineup analysis and opponent- and self-scouting. The school also receives schedule consulting as part of HDI’s partnership with the Horizon League.

To bounce back from a fifth-place finish in the league in 2023, Oakland brought in eight new players over the offseason, from Division 1 to the junior-college ranks. The result was a roster that blended old-school player development — senior and four-year starter Trey Townsend became the Horizon League Player of the Year, marking the 18th straight year Oakland had a first-team all-league player — with new-age player movement. (First-year transfer Jack Gohlke made 10 3’s in the win against Kentucky.)

In the past 25 years, Oakland has fielded 12 top-100 offenses, per KenPom. This year’s team wasn’t one of them; rather, it was Oakland’s second-best defense of the KenPom era. Oakland’s last two NCAA Tournament teams, in 2010 and 2011, each ranked in the top 35 nationally in adjusted tempo; this year’s team ranked 329th in offensive transition volume, another sign of the program’s ability to evolve.

After assembling a grueling non-conference schedule — Oakland led both Ohio State and Illinois in the second half, beat Xavier on the road and also played at Michigan State and Dayton — the Golden Grizzlies won the Horizon League regular-season and tournament championships, securing a No. 14 seed in the top half of all automatic bids.

The day after their matchup with 3-seed Kentucky was announced, HDI was able to meet in person with Oakland’s coaches to go over the opponent scouting report as well as substitution patterns, individual matchups and player tracking data. Our reps continued to provide insights throughout the week and even got to be in Pittsburgh for the Golden Grizzlies’ historic upset victory. As if that weren't gratifying enough, Coach Kampe gave HDI a shout-out in his radio interview the next day.

On the surface, Oakland might not seem like an ideal partner for HDI: long-tenured coach, one-bid conference, limited budget. But in reality, they are an ideal client because they believe in the power of data, trust our insights about and understanding of their program, and are willing to invest in their own continued growth. We are thrilled that all of America now knows what we've known for a while: that Coach Kampe and the Golden Grizzlies are winners — not because they have it all figured out, but because they realize that there is always something new to learn. Adapt or die.

This is a great week at HDI. For starters, we have multiple teams participating in the men’s Final Four — and rest assured that we are doing everything we can to ensure that an HDI team cuts down the nets again this year.

Although our in-season work is ongoing, this is also a time for us both to celebrate the season and to look ahead. After our year-end celebration dinner Wednesday night — where 19 HDI team members will gather — we’ll have strong presences at the men’s and women’s Final Fours in Phoenix and Cleveland, respectively.

In Cleveland, we’ll be running booth 40 at the courtside expo inside Huntington Convention Center. We’d love to see you there and talk more about how analytics can help you prepare smarter, play smarter and win more games.

And in Phoenix, we’ll be hosting our annual happy hour event at Mancuso’s, directly across the street from the convention center, on the corner of Washington and 3rd Street, on Friday from 3-5 p.m.

By any metric, it was an extremely successful March for HDI clients — our best season to date:

• We worked with 75 percent of the top-2 seeds, 65 percent of the top-5 seeds and 52 percent of the top-9 seeds in the men’s NCAA Tournament, along with 7 automatic bid winners.

• Twelve of the final 32, seven of the final 16 and three of the final eight men’s teams were HDI performance analytics clients.

• HDI also had a record five women’s basketball clients reach the NCAA Tournament.

In other news:

• Our co-founder Colton Houston was featured on the excellent Slappin' Glass podcast, where he talked about the origins of HDI, what makes us unique and where college basketball analytics is headed in the coming years.

• We unveiled our new and improved player database, designed to more easily allow coaches to filter, sort and compare every player in Division 1. (Reach out for a demo.)

• Five new programs have already committed to partnering with HDI for the 2024-25 season. Teams that sign up now get access to our transfer analytics resources for this current recruiting cycle. If you’re interested in learning more about what we can do to support your program as you head into the offseason, we’d love to talk more.

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