River Falls' Lori Johnson and her husband, Jeff, have five boys together. With Zac (21), Quincy (20), Preston (18), Cullen (15), and Vaughn (13), there hasn't been too much "girl talk" around the Johnson house for Lori during the past two decades. 

"I did talk Preston into getting a pedicure with me one time," said Johnson with a side-smile and a laugh. "He loved it, but their (boys) feet are gross. I felt bad for the nail tech."

Preston Johnson recently had two female Wildcat classmates drop off a free coffee to him. His younger brother, Vaughn, answered the door. Vaughn collected the liquid teenage peace offering for his older brother, thanked the girls, and promptly shut the front door. Preston, holed up in his room, was oblivious to the possible implications of the Gen Z coffee offering. As the girls were walking to the car, Lori Johnson yelled, "Preston, get down here, now!"

Lori Johnson knows what hustle is. She only lost seven games during her entire three-year varsity high school basketball career at Jefferson in southern Wisconsin. Hustle also defined her college basketball career at UW-La Crosse.   

"If there are girls ever over here, I always try to make them stay and talk to me," said the Pierce County poster child of boy moms. "Sometimes those boys need a little kick in the girlfriend department."

It, however, is not girlfriend season right now in the Johnson household. It's basketball season.

The Johnsons moved to River Falls in 2009. Lori and Jeff have been involved in the River Falls Youth Boys’ Basketball program coaching since 2011. She's been the boys' youth basketball board president for the last five years.  

"I would coach one team and Jeff would coach the other and try and make it work," said Johnson. "There were times when toddlers came to practice. It was important to us to be a part of their (her sons') story."

During her college years playing basketball at UW-La Crosse, Johnson coached girls' AAU teams during the summer. Her former high school team (Jefferson) had won the girls' WIAA state basketball title in 2005 and she helped coach the team the next season even though she was, according to her, "dripping with children."

"Basketball has been a big part of my life," said Johnson. "I love the game and I've put myself in position to learn from really good coaches. I was coached by really good coaches and I've taken pieces from all of it. I'm still learning."

When longtime Wildcat boys' basketball Head Coach Zac Campbell stepped down this past summer to be able to spend more time with his young kids, Lori Johnson met with new head coach Zach Turpin to discuss youth program "stuff."

The next thing Lori Johnson knew, she had a new job and title: River Falls Assistant Boys' Basketball Coach.

“She brings great knowledge about the game and she has great relationships with the kids," said Turpin. "Her relationship skills are so important because she can coach the kids hard and they listen to the message. She brings what's needed for the moment. She's built that trust and she can have the tough conversations but she knows how to lift them up, too."

A female coaching a male basketball team shouldn't be a story, but it is. According to the Department of Education in 2023, no men's basketball team at the NCAA Division I, II, or III level had a female head coach. On the flipside, 43% of NCAA women's basketball teams were coached by men. Those numbers were almost identical 20 years earlier in 2003.

Why the discrepancy?

"That's a good question," said Turpin. "I don't have an answer for that, maybe it's the culture and norm nationwide?"

Locally, in high school, of the 16 schools in the Big Rivers and Middle Border conferences, every boys’ basketball team is coached by a man and seven of the 16 girls' basketball teams are coached by men.

"I honestly didn't even think about any of that," said Turpin. "I needed a good coach, plain and simple."

"I think moms for boys are the soft place to fall," said Johnson referring to the communication aspect of coaching. "I think I play that role a little bit, but the biggest challenge for any coach is how to figure out the way to bring out the best in each of them individually."

"She gets on me bigtime," said senior guard Brody Graetz. "I'm at the top of the zone on defense and if I turn my head and don't jump the gap, she gets on me, but I like it. I definitely needed it."

Graetz currently leads the 3-2 Wildcats in scoring at almost 19 points per game and is shooting 40% from behind the arc.

"Coach Johnson preaches energy and she makes us keep talking to each other," said Graetz.

"I'm very specific with questions," said Johnson, "Communication is key and I know from having five sons and coaching boys for almost 15 years, focus on one thing at a time and be very specific."

"If I'm not confident in my shot," said son and starting point guard Preston Johnson, "She's the first person I go to have a confidence booster because she's really good with that stuff. I know she helps Eli (Johnson, no relation) a ton with working on ways to get the ball in the post more."

"All our coaches are good about joking around," continued Preston, whose younger brother, Cullen, is also on the team. "But they're also good about getting us locked in, so it's a good combination."

For Assistant Coach Lori Johnson, a great combination is basketball and boys. That's what she knows. 

After this past Friday night's practice, Coach Turpin asked Coach Johnson what she thought the team needed to work on.

"Ball pressure," Johnson told him. "You can't always shoot well, but you can always play hard defense. That's our expectation. Lazy players aren't going to play. I'm having fun. I'm still learning my role and how I fit, but I love film watching and the X's and O's part. It's really been exciting."