TROY — Michelle Owen has dedicated her entire career to helping other peoples’ children succeed in the classroom and athletics.

After 17 years of coaching the Troy High School girls volleyball team to heights never before seen in school history, Owen decided the time was right to spend more time with her own kids.

“It’s a personal thing, where I have too much going with my home life and my kids,” said Owen, who recently announced to her team she was stepping down as Troy’s volleyball coach. “My kids are in fall sports and I can’t really physically balance both things.”

Owen took over as Troy’s varsity volleyball coach in 2006, quickly turning the Trojans into a Dayton-area powerhouse. During her 17-year coaching career, Owen posted a career record of 308-108 (.740), making her far and away the winningest coach in school history. She led the Trojans to 11 conference titles in the Greater Western Ohio Conference and Miami Valley League. She has had countless players go on to compete in college, including a number of Division I players.

For her efforts, she was named a conference coach of the year nine times and District 9 coach of the year 12 times.

“This was a difficult decision because I love it, I love what I do and I love those girls,” Owen said. “I’m sure it’s going to be difficult, because I’ve never taught without (coaching). We’ve been able to get the right in there to buy in and we’ve been able to get the kids out for the team who are going to buy in.

“We had a really good group of sophomores my first year coaching, who would have been seniors in 2008, and they really bought in. We had that group of Karen Onuki and Breezy Strete and Kelly Montgomery who really bought in. They were the ones who were like, ‘We’re going to win a GWOC title.’ And it took a couple of years, but they did it.”

As her volleyball coach career comes to a close, Owen, who will continue teaching mathematics at Troy High School, and her husband Jeff, who also teaches at Troy and has been heavily involved in coaching the Troy volleyball program, will turn more of their focus to twin sons Carter and Callen, who will be seventh graders next season. Both are heavily involved in sports and will be happy to have mom watching from the sidelines next fall.

“I think they will, because now they’ll say, ‘Hey, are you going to be at my game?’ and sometimes no is the answer,” Owen said. “They understand, but they’ll be like, ‘Oh, ok.’ After the game, a lot of times they’ll be like, ‘Oh, I had a good game,’ or ‘Oh, I made a good save.’ Now I’ll be there for more of those moments.”