It’s not how most Ivy League graduates picture their first year out of school — making 400 bucks a week, working weekends, and sleeping in buses rumbling through Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi.

But while most of his classmates were battling each other for jobs during the Great Recession in 2009, Ryan Garbutt was battling the Rio Grande Valley Killer Bees for the final playoff spot in the Central Hockey League’s Southern Conference.

And he was loving every minute of it.

“I was just happy to be getting a paycheck to play hockey,” Garbutt said. “Being in a place like Corpus Christi, where your rink’s on the Gulf of Mexico and you’ve got beautiful weather all year — I was enjoying myself. But I also realized that if I didn’t start working my way up, I wouldn’t be able to play hockey forever.”

See, Garbutt’s a pretty smart guy. Smart enough to earn a degree in economic sociology from Brown University. Smart enough to see the big picture. Smart enough to realize that versatility would be his quickest path to the NHL. And smart enough to know that Chicago was the ultimate hockey destination.

He got a taste of the city and its growing obsession with hockey in 2010-11 with the AHL’s Chicago Wolves. And one of the snowiest winters in recent Chicago history did little to cool Garbutt, an Edmonton native, on the idea that he wanted to play for the Blackhawks. Even as a member of the Dallas Stars the past four seasons, Garbutt always hoped he’d one day land back in Chicago.

So when he got the call that the Stars had traded him to the Hawks as part of the Patrick Sharp trade over the summer, Garbutt said he “cranked up” his offseason workouts even harder, knowing just how tough a lineup it is to crack, and just how badly he wanted it.

“It was definitely a destination that I aspired to be part of,” Garbutt said. “I’d always get up to play Chicago. Even at pre-game skates in Chicago, I’d make sure I worked hard, hoping that maybe the GM and management for Chicago were watching. It’s funny how things work out like that.”

Garbutt opened training camp as an extra forward, maybe even on the bubble for a roster spot. He opened the season with a job, but as a fourth-liner. And less than a week into the season, he’s already in one of the best spots in hockey — the left wing alongside Jonathan Toews and Marian Hossa on the Hawks’ top line.

Of course, quick, unusual climbs are nothing new for Garbutt.

After Brown and after one season in the now-defunct CHL, an impressed Texas Stars coach Jeff Pyle got Garbutt a tryout with the Gwinnett Gladiators, the ECHL affiliate of the Atlanta Thrashers. After just 10 games there, he got called up to the AHL’s Wolves. A year later, he was in Dallas at the game’s highest level. In fact, he’s never been demoted. And every step of the way, it’s been the same thing — catch on as a bottom-six winger, prove himself, move up to a top-six spot, prove himself again, get called up a level and start over again as a bottom-six winger. He did it in the CHL. He did it in the ECHL. He did it in the AHL. And now he’s doing it in the NHL.

There’s no guarantee Garbutt will stay on the Hawks’ top line for long. Joel Quenneville already has tried Marko Dano, Andrew Shaw and Teuvo Teravainen up there as he gets a feel for his revamped roster. But he likes what Garbutt brings — a responsible two-way player who can be trusted against opponents’ top lines, and who has the skill (he had 17 goals in 2013-14) to keep up with the superstars to his right.

“He gives us speed, directness,” Quenneville said. “He’s an up-and-down type of guy.”

Quenneville has deemed that the “lottery line,” as in whoever gets that spot has hit the jackpot. But it doesn’t take an Ivy League education to know there’s a lot more to getting that spot — and keeping it — than just luck.

“Those are two pretty easy guys to play with,” Garbutt said. “They play so well away from the puck. They’re good defensively. And they’re always in the right spots. I feel if I just play my game and use my speed to my advantage I can do well playing with those guys. It’s a great spot to be.”

Email: mlazerus@suntimes.com
Twitter: @marklazerus