Winter Commencement 2024: Busy business student Ashlee Owens sees her hoop dreams coming true

Senior Ashlee Owens estimates she spends about 30 hours a week fulfilling her role as a student manager for Radford's men's basketball, a job that involves attending games, supervising the team's equipment and keeping track of players' stats and records.

Owens first applied for the position in 2023 after seeing an ad posting. When she didn't get an immediate response, she circled back with a phone call and promptly won herself the gig.

That degree of tenacity has helped broaden her responsibilities in other ways: When she was told she'd only be working home games, Owens lobbied for a seat on the bus, got one and now rides along with the Highlanders whenever they play away.

"The coach always talks about 'just keep moving and keep growing ... don't look back,'" she recently said.

It's advice she's clearly taken to heart.

In addition to her athletics, Owens, who hails from Potomac Falls, Virginia, also double-majors in marketing and business management. Last month, the same week she was on hand for a Radford win against Old Dominion University, she was also in Roanoke, embedded in the bustling Disrupt Up Emerging Technology conference, which she attended as part of a Venture Lab entrepreneurship class.

Beyond the classroom and the basketball court, she's donned no shortage of other hats as well. Prior to coming to college, she worked as a nanny for more than five years, and since then, Owens has served as an accounting clerk for a Loudoun County company, was recently a brand ambassador for Nova Tastings in the New River Valley and has even spent time as a hostess at a trampoline park.

"Every opportunity given to me, I take it and run with it," she explained. "That's just how I live life. Because I feel like I'll miss out on something if I don't."

Once she graduates, Owens plans to stick around to earn her MBA and continue working with the team through the conference season.

"Hopefully, I'm going to secure a role in the NCAA, and then eventually maybe in the NBA," she said. "My dream goal is to be … a combination of player development and some type of management.

"I definitely love the environment of basketball and I see myself working in it long-term."