George Richards, FHN Publisher
SUNRISE — When it came to the NHL Trade Deadline, the Florida Panthers did not have much to work with.
After two-plus years of wheeling-and-dealing, general manager Bill Zito did not have the salary cap space nor the assets to do the kind of shopping he had in the past.
While there was a lot he would have liked to have added to his team, Zito and the Panthers stood pat and left the team as is.
“It’s like shopping in Bal Harbour with empty pockets,’’ Zito said in a wide-ranging interview with the South Florida media following the end of the NHL’s trading day.
Zito spoke about the moves made in the past, if he thinks this team can rally and make the playoffs as well as his thoughts on the job Paul Maurice has done in his first season behind the Florida bench.
Since arriving in 2020, Zito has completely overturned the Florida roster as only Sasha Barkov, Aaron Ekblad, Eetu Luostarinen and Sergei Bobrovsky remain from the team when he was hired to replace Dale Tallon a month after the team’s quick exit from the 2020 Toronto postseason bubble.
Zito’s many moves over the past couple of years meant one day, the credit card bill would come due.
Empty pockets, indeed.
Since 2021, the Panthers have unloaded most of their high-end draft picks in acquiring Sam Bennett, Sam Reinhart, Matthew Tkachuk, Claude Giroux and Ben Chiarot.
The last two ended up to be expensive rentals, the price of going for it at last year’s deadline.
Florida is without first-round picks in its next three drafts — including a non-protected lottery pick to Montreal if the Panthers do miss the playoffs this season — and is missing a second-round pick in 2024.
The things teams wanted in return for their NHL players, well, the Panthers did not have to give.
“It was it was a different experience than when we started because we knew our assets are depleted; the picks, the prospects we can’t give up,’’ Zito said.
ONWARD AND UPWARD
Florida came into Deadline Day four points out of the playoffs with 19 games remaining.
There was speculation floating around the league that the Panthers may wheel off some players with the possibility Florida would make a small addition despite their limited assets and tenuous cap situation.
In the end, Zito said the offers made did not sway him from giving this team — which should have Sasha Barkov and Sam Bennett back in the lineup tonight against the Penguins — one last chance to make the NHL’s big dance.
“As a manager, you always want to get players and pieces and help your team,’’ Zito said. “Sometimes you are handcuffed and that can be a little frustrating.
“We did not want to make moves just to make moves. It is important that if we do it, we have to do it right. … For the right deal, then you have to do it. If it is best for the organization and it’s best for the team, sometimes you have to endure pain.
“But in this instance, there wasn’t a real value that pushed us to the point where we would subtract, ironically, for the betterment of the team.”
Pending free agents Radko Gudas, Eric and Marc Staal are among those who will live to fight on with the Panthers.
Gudas, Zito said, is a player he would like to have return next season. There have been talks about an extension.
“We started talking a little bit to Radko,” he said. “We will continue. We would like to keep him if we can. But it’s a process. We want to focus on these games and make the playoffs. We’ll evaluate everything at the end of the year.”
MAURICE ‘HAS BEEN FANTASTIC’
One of the first offseason moves the Panthers made was replacing interim coach Andrew Brunette with Maurice — a veteran of 25 NHL seasons behind an NHL bench.
The Panthers wanted to change their style of play after being swept by the Lightning in the second round after having the franchise’s best regular season in their history.
Maurice was brought in to make the Panthers a tougher team to play and get away from the free-wheeling, end-to-end style which brought them so much success the past couple of seasons.
“I think he has been fantastic,’’ Zito said of Maurice, who is in the first year of a three-year contract. “Our record on the ice is not as good as where it was, but when you look at where we were — $8 million in salary cap deadspace — that means players.
“He came in trying to harness the energy and put it into defense and structure as opposed to a freewheeling style. That is hard to do. It is hard to teach, it is hard to get people to buy into, understand and execute. He did it with excellence at a high level and it is a process. …
“When we interviewed Paul, you could tell he was the right fit for this group. He is. He is teaching and the individuals are improving. It is coming. I take no solace in knowing we would like to be higher up and be in a better place. But it is coming. He is implementing the systems that need to be implemented because the real goal is winning the Stanley Cup.’’
The results, obviously, are not what the Panthers hoped for.
The team knew it would step back from last year’s historical run but they probably did not see the team fall this far.
But, as Zito explained, the team is looking at its tough cap situation which has forced the team to play games shorthanded as well as injuries to key players throughout the season as being one reason the overall record has dropped so drastically.
“I am so pleased with Paul on so many different levels,” Zito said. “I believe he is the man to lead us to the Cup.”
CAN THE PANTHERS MAKE A RUN?
There is still time for Florida to make the playoffs although the team is going to have to go on a sustained run it has not shown in its first 63 games.
The Panthers probably have to win 15 of their final 19 games — after only winning three consecutive games once this season.
“We have to win a lot of them,” Zito said. “No matter what I say, they are empty words. But I can tell you the truth and say I am confident they can do it. If you tell me intellectually, the odds are this — OK, they are. But people have overcome much bigger odds than what we are facing. One thing I do know and correct me if you think I am wrong, but we do not quit.”
And, the Panthers are looking ahead to the future — and not just the final few weeks of this season.
Last year, with the Panthers looking like a legitimate Stanley Cup contender, Zito went all-in and traded future assets like draft picks and prospects for immediate help.
In the summer, he was looking for extended success in trading Jonathan Huberdeau, MacKenzie Weegar, a 2026 first-round pick and a prospect for the next eight years of Matthew Tkachuk’s prime.
The Panthers have most of their key players locked in for the next couple of seasons following this one.
But making the playoffs is something Zito stressed is something he believes this team can do right now.
”We have spent a lot of time and a lot of effort trying to get our culture moving forward in the right direction,’’ Zito said.
”We did not want to quit on the group. We are in a tenuous situation, no doubt. But the room believes and I believe in the room. We’re not going to quit on the team, we’re not going to quit on the fans who believe in us.
“If there was a deal to be made to help our team — short term, long term — we would have done it. We evaluated each one and we’re OK holding.”