When Allison Meyer was a forward on the Fennimore High School girls basketball team in the mid-1990s, all eyes were on her. On her way to winning all-conference honors her sophomore through senior seasons, Meyer 's play turned quite a few heads.

Now, she 's back at her alma mater turning heads again -- for a different reason.

Earlier this summer, the 29-year-old Meyer was named Fennimore boys varsity basketball coach. She will replace Mark Fifrick, who stepped down after 12 seasons.

Fifrick approached Meyer -- who coached the school 's junior varsity boys team the past two years -- and encouraged her to go after the job.

"He kind of came (to me) at the end of the season, " Meyer said. "Mark gave me an opportunity (to apply), and I thought I 'd jump at it. "

Meyer seized the opportunity and beat out a handful of other applicants. But for some, there was a problem: How could a woman coach a boys team?

"There 's a lot of that going around right now, " Fennimore junior Joe Carl said. "They don 't think a woman is capable of coaching boys. "

In fact, some of those opinions came from Carl 's teammates.

"I know some of the guys didn 't want her to get it (at first), " he said.

"They were kind of iffy at first, " said Carl 's teammate, Ben Hertrampf, who will be one of the team 's five seniors. "They think it 's fine now, but they were kind of shocked at first. "

In his freshman year, Carl played for Meyer on the JV team and moved up to varsity his sophomore season. While he was disappointed that Fifrick was stepping down, he knew what to expect from his new coach.

"I was happy for her, " said Carl of Meyer 's hiring. "She disciplined us well, taught us good fundamentals and I just liked her. "

While Hertrampf wasn 't coached by Meyer at the JV level, he 's already thrown his support to her.

"I 'm with her all the way, " he said. "I think she 'll be a tremendous coach. "

A select group

According to Mark Miller, editor of Wisconsin Basketball Yearbook and wishoops.net, Meyer will become just the fourth woman to coach a boys varsity team in Wisconsin since the 1970s, and the first since 2005.

Carla Wissbroecker was the most recent woman to coach a boys team in Wisconsin, when she did so with Elcho from 2003-05. Kellie Manning coached the boys team at Ithaca in 1989 and 1990, and Kelly Butterworth coached the Fall River boys in the 1970s.

While those three lasted just a few seasons each at their schools, Miller thinks Meyer might have some staying power at Fennimore.

"I think she 's going to do well, " Miller said. "I just have a sense that she knows full well what she 's getting into. "

Learning from the best

Meyer doesn 't list any players as her role models, but one name stands out when she lists her coaching idols: Bo Ryan.

Ryan -- now head coach of the Wisconsin Badgers -- was the coach of the men 's team at UW-Platteville during some of that time that Meyer played there, from 1997-2001 (he left after the '98-99 season). Meyer learned a lot just by watching how Ryan ran his team.

"It was always fun to work summer camps with him there and see his relationships with his players, " Meyer said of Ryan. "When he 'd have practice, the gym would be drop dead silent until the ball was put into play. "

In his 15 seasons as the Platteville coach, Ryan led his team to four NCAA Division III championships -- two of those coming while Meyer was playing on the women 's team.

"Just seeing how his program was run, it was like, Wow, ' " Meyer said. "I was always interested in what he was doing with his program. "

Paving her own path

Meyer 's first coaching gig came as coach of the girls JV team in Montello, where she stayed for four years.

In 2006, she and her husband, Kurt, moved to Fennimore -- a community of about 2,400, 72 miles west of Madison with about 350 students at the high school (grades seven through 12 are in one building) -- where she now teaches seventh- and eighth-grade science and social studies.

The opportunity to coach the boys JV team came while she was working at a volleyball camp.

"Mark Fifrick came up and said, Hey, I 've got a JV boys basketball job open this winter if you want to coach with me. ' At first I was like, Holy smokes, ' " Meyer said. "I 'd never really thought about coaching boys.

"I thought, Well, there 's not a position open in the girls program. It sure would be fun. We 'll see how it goes at the JV level. ' I did that for two years, and it 's turned into this opportunity. "

As JV coach, her record the first year was 11-9 and the second year it was 13-7.

"I think there 's a lot of men that want the opportunity, more so than women that are looking for the opportunity to coach, " Meyer said. "In general -- men or women -- I think there are more guys who are trying to get into that role. I think a lot of women just haven 't had the opportunity. Fennimore gave me the opportunity, so I 'm going to make the most of it. "

Jerry Petitgoue hopes more women are given that chance.

Petitgoue is the head coach at Cuba City -- which plays in the Southwest Wisconsin Activities League Conference with Fennimore -- and the executive director of the Wisconsin Basketball Coaches Association. He coached his team to a SWAL-best 20-4 record last year and will face off against Meyer in the coming season.

At that point, Petitgoue won 't see his counterpart as a woman; she 'll just be another coach.

"I 've always had the philosophy that whether you 're coaching boys or whether you 're coaching girls, there 's not a great deal of difference. It 's coaching, " Petitgoue said. "I think she 's very well qualified and I think it 's great. Guys coaching women 's basketball, we don 't think anything about it. Now women coaching guys basketball, I think it 's long overdue. "

The road ahead

Stepping into the varsity coaching position will present challenges for Meyer. She 'll constantly have to hear people -- both in Fennimore and elsewhere -- questioning whether a woman is up to coaching a boys team.

But Meyer doesn 't let them bother her. She plans to let her coaching speak for itself.

"I guess I would just say, Well, come out and catch a game. ' You 'll see that my teams are going to work hard, they 're going to be well-coached and they 're going to have an understanding of the game, " Meyer said. "Whether I 'm male or female doesn 't really make much of a difference. "

When it comes time for her team to suit up in the locker room this season, Meyer doesn 't foresee any gender-related problems. When coaching JV boys, Meyer said she would make sure her team was fully dressed before she entered the locker room. Other times, they would meet in a different room before tip-off.

"With my JV team, we just met in a classroom when we had home games instead of meeting in the locker room, " Meyer said. "At away games, the situation is everybody goes in first, and then in the past I 've always coached with a man and I guess I would assume I 'd have a man as an assistant. They would always go in and I 'm just the last one in there. "

Carl knows this situation may cause some uneasiness, but he said it will be those in the community feeling that way, not the guys on the team.

"They don 't like the idea that a woman is in the locker room with a bunch of 17, 18-year-old kids, " Carl said. "But it 's the same thing with our JV team. There 's a 21-year-old coaching our JV girls. If they look at it the same way, then that should be a problem, too. But I don 't think they really see that. They just see an older woman in the locker room with a bunch of young boys and they don 't really like that, I guess. "

While Petitgoue doesn 't see gender as an issue, he knows very well that others will be looking at Meyer 's situation with a careful eye.

"I 'd be na ve to think that there aren 't some long-held prejudices out there, that there are guys that think they do it best and only a guy can coach a guys team. And I think that 's wrong, " Petitgoue said. "I think the barriers are being broken down.

"The bottom line is, Are you qualified to do the job? ' And then if you do the job well, it 'll be absolutely no story. If she comes in and does an outstanding job, nobody will even know that she 's a woman coaching guys basketball. "

Jim Prochaska, Fennimore 's athletic director, feels those in the Fennimore community will have Meyer 's back. It will be outsiders who haven 't seen her coach before that she 'll have to worry about.

"I think that probably her biggest problems are going to be from outside of our district, because a lot of people know who she is and know her situation, " Prochaska said.

"But outside of our community, they might think, Oh, she 's a woman. She might not have what it takes. ' I don 't really know. I guess we 'll see when the year comes. "