If I could be King for a day Ryan McQuillan '05.5 finds a home in the NHL as a L.A. King video technician

Author: Todd Swisher

Ryan McQuillan '05.5 cannot hide himself in a hockey organization: his love for the game is too out-in-the-open.

McQuillan has gone pro. He has reached the highest level of hockey the world has to offer. As a video technician for the Los Angeles Kings, his main job is to edit NHL game tapes to the specifications of men more directly associated with the winning and the losing ends of the outfit.

If he is told to isolate the shifts of Boston Bruins defenseman Zdeno Chara, he does so, leaving all else on the cutting room floor. As, a native New Englander, McQuillan's team is still the Bruins, but he "wouldn't mind seeing the Kings win a Cup."

His NHL responsibilities consist of 100-hour weeks with "peanuts for pay," but his work is essentially what he has done for the past decade.

In high school, McQuillan looked to fill the winter gap in his athletic calendar, which contained soccer games in the fall and lacrosse contests in the spring, by becoming the manager of the hockey team. "Managing was a way to be part of a team without playing," he said.

His work ethic and competence so impressed the coach that he was more than happy to assist McQuillan in his search for a program to continue with the job in college. Boston College was his first choice, he would be paid to perform his duties there, but when McQuillan was put in touch with Middlebury Coach Bill Beaney, his plans changed. As McQuillan put it, "Once you meet Beaney you're going to work for him."

Beginning as the equipment manager, McQuillan acquired a myriad of responsibilities. On top of fixing equipment, he came to arrange accommodations and dining for road trips, advise on personnel decisions and counsel players whenever they approached him with a problem.

"They would talk to me about all kinds of stuff. Half the time I was a psychologist," said McQuillan.

His name never appeared in a Middlebury scoring summary, but his impact on Panther hockey extended far beyond just goals or assists.

Middlebury rattled off five straight national championships between 1995 and 1999, but had not won another until McQuillan's first season working as a sophomore for the 2003-2004 campaign. The Panthers repeated their heroics twice more. "I may or not take credit for that," McQuillan joked.

He balanced his loyalties between coaching staff and players. Sometimes players would use him to voice something to a coach and at other times the coaches made him a mouthpiece for disseminating information. He would also issue McQuillan originals. He drew these remarks from a basic template: He wanted players to work as hard as he did and he did not mince words. "Guys knew I wasn't going to blow sunshine up their [censored]," he said, "but that I wouldn't throw them under the bus either."

McQuillan is not out on the ice in the service of the L.A. Kings, nor even behind the bench, but if you think he fails to contribute or that he does not have the mindset of a competitor, you are not familiar with his Middlebury career. On a typical in-season day he might arrive at the arena three hours before practice, stay an hour and a half afterwards, eat dinner, and return for additional tasks. He lifted with the team, he skated following practice, and above all, he worked his tail off.

It is a Middlebury education at work in more ways than one. The joint History and Film and Media Culture major credits his professors with indulging his passion. "When I would inform professors of my schedule, they never said 'you're not a player.'" If it were not for the generous deadlines granted him by Professor Kathryn Morse of the History Department, he does not know how he would have completed his thesis.

School was no afterthought for McQuillan, but it was his extracurricular activities that led him to this, his first job. Following commencement, he considered going into television production and had just come out of an interview with CBS when he received a call.

It was Nikolai Bobrov '99, who was then climbing the ladder of the L.A. Kings NHL franchise and was willing to get McQuillan an interview for an entry-level position. According to McQuillan, "It's a tribute to how deep the Midd hockey connection goes. Coach [Beaney] has contact with guys who played here in the '70s."

McQuillan's new racket is "tedious, but a foot in the door." NHL hockey is a business, and as such, the personal relationships he had become accustomed to are harder to find. A testament to the Panther bond, McQuillan was in town this September to join the wedding party of the team's Zamboni operator. "I would bet it's not like this anywhere else," McQuillan said.