UMass Lowell Men’s Basketball Head Coach Pat Duquette has announced the addition of new assistant coach David Johnson ahead of the 2025-26 season. Johnson joins the coaching staff with eight years of coaching experience at the high school level, most recently serving as the Head Varsity Boy’s Basketball Coach at Jackson-Reed High School inWashington, D.C.
“I am excited about hiring David ‘Tee’ Johnson, who previously coached former River Hawk Ayinde Hikim,” said Duquette. “Tee brings great energy, character and basketball IQ. Along with the rest of our coaches, I know he will help relate to and develop our players, both on and off the court.”
In Johnson’s four years at Jackson-Reed, he brought the team to unprecedented levels of success, posting a 112-21 overall record in his tenure while winning the 2022 and 2024 DCIAA Championship and the 2025 DCIAA regular season title. Bringing the team to new heights where they earned national recognition as a Top-25 ranked high school by both ESPN and USA Today, including a program-best 19th during the 2023-24 season, Johnson was tabbed the 2023 DCIAA Coach of the Year.
“It is an honor to join the staff at UMass Lowell,” said Johnson. “I am grateful to Coach Duquette for the opportunity. I’m excited and ready to develop the players, and contribute to the winning culture and River Hawk community. Go River Hawks!”
Alongside coaching at Jackson-Reed, Johnson has also served as the head coach for Team Durant, part of the Nike Elite Youth Basketball League (EYBL), since 2019. In his time there, he created a competitive environment with challenging practice plans for top players in the DMV. Creating and facilitating off-season training programs and developing new drills for players, Johnson’s innovative methods helped lead the team to become a 2022 Nike EYBL Elite 8 Finalist.
Prior to becoming a head coach, Johnson was the head assistant varsity boy’s basketball coach at Jackson-Reed, where he assisted in directing all aspects of the program. Some of his duties in that role included instructing basketball offense and defense fundamentals, communicating with college coaches to market student-athletes, coordinating off-season individual player improvement programs, and practice and game preparation, including directing practice in the absence of the head coach.
Also the owner of On A String Skills Training, he began his coaching career as the head junior varsity boy’s basketball coach at Jackson-Reed in 2016.
Johnson played basketball at Lyndon State College where he earned his bachelor’s in sports management in 2015 before earning his master’s in education from Moreland University in 2020.
UMass Lowell adds Johnson as Assistant Basketball Coach
