Perhaps the most high-profile example came in mid-May, when Xavier University men's basketball Associate Head Coach Pat Kelsey decided to step down and pursue employment outside the coaching profession. Kelsey, who has a degree in business administration from Xavier, hopes to be able to spend more time with his wife and two daughters.

"For a long time, I have struggled internally with this decision," Kelsey said in a statement. "Four years ago, I witnessed firsthand coach [Skip] Prosser's death in the basketball office at Wake Forest. That day, my perspective on the profession and life was forever altered. My role as a father and husband is everything to me, and the rigors of this business can make that challenging."

Xavier Head Coach Chris Mack, who hired Kelsey in 2009, said he understood his now former assistant's decision.

"Nowadays, college basketball is 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and the balance between career and family can be difficult," Mack told the Sporting News. "I respect and, in many ways, understand his decision to put family first. Kels will always be part of the Xavier basketball family even as he moves in a different direction professionally."

One month later, a similar situation played out at Ohio State University, when men's basketball assistant Brandon Miller stepped down. According to the Columbus Dispatch, Miller had an "aha moment" at a retirement party for his father in his hometown of New Castle, Ind., this past spring.

His father, Roger Miller, was a teacher and assistant basketball coach for 39 years at a local high school. He declined opportunities to be a head coach elsewhere because his family enjoyed living in New Castle.

"As he was going through all this (at the party), I thought back to the way I was raised and I looked at my father and was extremely proud of who he was and of our relationship," Brandon Miller told the Dispatch. "If there was any 'aha moment,' that hit home. It very much hit home."

Miller, who was an assistant at Ohio State for seven seasons, plans to do something in the business world in his next career.

"I look at my life and the first thing that I want to accomplish when it's all said and done is I want to be a very good husband and I want to be a terrific father," Miller told the Dispatch. "And my next opportunity in terms of what I want to do is going to be a situation where I can have more balance in my life."

Coaches stepping down for family reasons isn't limited to basketball, however. At Michigan State University, Head Men's Golf Coach Sam Puryear resigned to care for an ailing family member. Puryear will, however, continue to work with Michigan State by running the athletic department's youth golf outreach programs in Detroit. His four-year tenure in East Lansing was highlighted by the 2008 Big Ten Conference title and 2008 conference Coach of the Year award.

"This has been a very difficult decision for my immediate family because Michigan State is a special place, but we know that life is short and the time that we have to spend with our loved ones is precious," Puryear said in a statement. "I'm tremendously thankful to MSU for the wonderful opportunity, but I feel compelled to be closer to the people in my life who need me the most as a son, a husband and a father, and that's where my focus lies."

At Erskine College, Head Women's Lacrosse Coach Kristie Quigley was also interested in spending more time close to family--but not getting out of the coaching profession entirely. That's why she decided to leave her post to take a head coaching job at Seton Hill University.

"I appreciate the tremendous opportunity that Erskine gave me to start the women's lacrosse program," Quigley said in a statement. "But Seton Hill gives us a chance to move closer to our families."

At the high school level, Southern Lee High School in Sanford, N.C., recently lost the only girls' basketball coach the school has ever known. Donna Taylor, who was named Cape Fear Valley Conference Coach of the Year in 2006-07 and led the program to three playoff appearances in her six years, decided to step down for family reasons.

Taylor's daughter, Brianna, will be a junior on next year's Southern Lee team, and her son, Chad, is a student and plans to walk on to the basketball team at the University of North Carolina-Charlotte.

"It was a very hard decision," Donna Taylor told the Sanford Herald. "It was a family decision and it really came down to being a mother versus being a coach. Being a mother is more important ... but I'll be in the stands every game like any other parent, and I'll be their biggest fan."

The football program at Northgate High School in Pittsburgh, Pa., will also have a new head coach this fall after Mike Pipak, who coached the squad the past four years, stepped down. Pipak wants to spend more time with his four children, ages 17, 15, 13, and eight.

"I have a family and four children who are very active, and I got tired of rushing to their games and activities," Pipak told the Post-Gazette. "I've been coaching for 26 years, and I lost a little bit of the fire that you need."

He will, however, retain his job as a social studies teacher at Northgate and has not ruled out a return to coaching at some point.

"I've had a lot of full days as a coach," Pipak told the Post-Gazette. "When you love something, you don't worry about the time. I'd definitely like to get back into coaching."

Mike Phelps is an Assistant Editor at Athletic Management.