You know Brian Riley, right? He’s Marybeth’s husband…. she’s the librarian at the Highland Falls Intermediate School and Fort Montgomery Elementary School. Or maybe you know him because he’s Jack, Dani and Brendan’s dad? Oh wait, maybe you know him because he’s Don and Helen Feldman’s son-in-law, or if you’ve lived here for a long time, you know that he’s the son of the late Jack (and Maureen) Riley, royalty in the world of ice hockey because his dad both played and coached U.S. Olympic hockey teams, in addition to being (another) celebrated Army coach.

If you don’t know Brian Riley and met him for the first time, those are the type of things he might tell you about himself. He’s a native of the Town of Highlands, spending the majority of his life living on West Point, but also many, many years living in Highland Falls.

What Riley might not tell you, if you didn’t already know, is that he’s the now recently retired coach of Army hockey himself.

Brian Riley walked out of his West Point office for the last time on Wednesday, April 30 after 33 years of coaching Army hockey – 21 of those as head coach. It’s a job he loved.

There are plenty of ‘whys’ to talk about, but first, he said in an interview on day one of his retirement, there’s a short discussion to be had about what’s next for the still-young coach.

“The answer is, I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve got to find a job.” He says it really was strange to wake up that morning and not have somewhere to go.

Riley, who turns 66 this summer, says he’s giving himself a month to do so, although, he also said he was flying out the next day to speak at two hockey-related events in Florida. He started day one of retirement, May 1, by doing some yard work, but he knows he’s not ready to make that his full-time job.

“I’ll tell you one thing,” he said, noting he, Marybeth and their dogs have recently moved from quarters at West Point back to a home they already owned in Highland Falls. “Moving is awful. We’ve been working on that for a couple of months now.”
So … back to the ‘why’ of his retirement.

First, this past season was the 75th straight year of having a Riley at the helm of Army hockey. He was named head coach in 2004, succeeding his brother Rob, who succeeded their dad, Jack. The Riley’s were the 14th, 15th and16th men to ever coach the Black Knights. “I thought that a combined number of 75 was a good number to retire on,” he said. (Although, his son, Jack, remains with the team in an assistant role, so the Riley name continues to be affiliated with the program.)

Which leads him to another reason to retire.

“It was time to turn the program over to Zach (McKelvie),” he said. McKelvie is a 2009 USMA graduate, who has been serving as Riley’s associate head coach for the past nine seasons.

“He is more than prepared to run this program,” Riley says. “He’s one of the finest young coaches in college today – he has such a love for the academy and the program; it was a no brainer for Army to hire him.”

A third reason for his retirement is that he sees the landscape of college athletics changing, with the implementation of the transfer portal and the NIL – the Name, Image, and Likeness program that allows student-athletes to now profit from their personal brand through commercial endorsements, autograph signings, social media posts, and other activities.

“It was time to either adapt, or get out of the way,” he said.

Riley said he didn’t regret his decision after making the announcement last August that it was his final season, but he also acknowledges that there is a lot he will miss – “mostly being around the cadets, but also the feeling of those big wins”. He said his final year was pretty amazing, with former players, family friends, collegeagues and others turning up in ice rinks all over the country to wish him well. His final game at West Points Tate Rink – and the after-party at the SouthGate Tavern – stand out; the stands were full of high school friends that evening.

While Riley doesn’t know what jobs are ahead of him, he’s pretty sure it won’t be coaching. But he does want to maybe get involved with young athletes.

“I want to do something where I can give back,” he said, “where I can help influence some young hockey players. If I get involved with hockey again, I want it to be at the grass roots level, again, to maybe impact young kids.”

He says that he vividly recalls his days of youth hockey – “youth hockey was amazing growing up in Highland Falls,” he said, recalling his coaches, like Bob Dyroff and Charlie Weyant. He recalls skating at Smith Rink on West Point. Interestingly, when Riley was a student at O’Neill High School there was no ice hockey team – he played soccer and golf and ran track.

Impacting youth, Riley added, is important to him because of the West Point family he has built through the years. If you are spending any time with him you’ll note he wears two bracelets daily, recognizing two of his former players, Major Thomas Kennedy and First Lieutenant Derek Hines, who were both killed in service to this country.

“I need to make sure their legacy lives on,” he said, “and telling young hockey players about them is one way to do that. For many years now Riley has taken speaking engagements where he talks about them -- I’d go to the top of any mountain to tell their stories,” he said. “I feel like that is a responsibility that I have.”

Just last week he spoke to a group of cadets at an ‘Inspiration to Serve’ ceremony at the West Point Cemetery, standing at Kennedy’s grave.

Back to Brian and Marybeth’s own kids for a minute. While Jack remains with Army (“it was so special to be able to share so many moments with him this past year,” Brian said), son Brendan was recently named the head coach of the Long Island University hockey team. (“I’m not going to help him coach, but I will offer him advice when he asks”). Dani, the Riley’s middle child, is a Soul Cycle instructor in the area, Riley says (“and I can tell you one thing I won’t be doing in my retirement … I went to one of her classes once and she almost killed me. I’m not going back!”)

Marybeth isn’t ready to leave her position with the HF-FMCSD yet, so Riley will be on his own in retirement for at least a while.
“Hopefully at some point there will be palm trees and sand in our future,” he said, “but not yet. This is home and we’ll be right here.”

As the interview closed, Riley got a little sentimental.

“To be able to grow up in West Point and Highland Falls and then to be able to raise our children here … I couldn’t have had it any better. I’ve had the best life. To want to, and be able to, stay in my hometown … most people don’t get to do that.”

And then he had to go. Those dogs weren’t going to walk themselves.