RALEIGH, N.C. — From the bowels of the Lenovo Center, where his Florida Panthers are going through morning preparations for a game that can propel them to their third consecutive Stanley Cup Final, Bill Zito appears as comfortable as he would be on his couch.
He has spent most of his 60 years on the planet in arenas — first as a hockey player born in Pittsburgh and raised in Wisconsin, later as an agent who founded ACME World Sports, and finally as an executive — and they are where he feels at home.
So, it should come as no surprise that with the biggest game of the season nearing and the pressure mounting, Zito is feeling calm, happy and, thankfully for us, talkative.
“I feel totally relaxed,” he says. “We’re in the Eastern Conference Finals. No matter what, life’s pretty good.”
It’s been this way for some time now, with the Panthers enjoying so much success under his watch.
Zito took over as GM from Dale Tallon in September of 2020. He inherited great players — like captain Aleksander Barkov and goaltender Sergei Bobrovsky, to name a couple — but, with the help of the hockey lifers he immediately surrounded himself with, he built on that foundation to create the perennial contender we see before us. And so, he’s rightfully being recognized for that with his second consecutive nomination for the Jim Gregory Award for general manager of the year.
Still, the idea of being a finalist and sharing that honour with someone as esteemed as Dallas Stars GM Jim Nill, who has won the award in each of the last two years, feels fantastical to Zito.
“I promise you, you never think about being put in the same sentence as Jim Nill,” he says. “He’s not only one of the best GMs; he’s one of the finest people I’ve ever met.”
“I was an agent, it was the 22nd or 23rd of December, and I had a potential client and his dad who asked if they could have tickets to the Red Wings (when Nill was still working in Detroit),” Zito started. “I was recruiting this player, and it was a big guy, and I said, ‘Yeah.’
“I called Valtteri Filppula, who was there and arranged it. Then I got a phone call at about 6:00 p.m., and they say, ‘Billy, there’s no tickets.’
“I just panicked. Maybe the player forgot to leave them. This guy and his dad drove a long way. Maybe from Brampton, Ont., to Detroit around Christmas Day… I called Jimmy Nill, asking him to help me, and he goes, ‘Settle down. What’s the guy’s name?’ Then he walks out there himself, meets the player and his dad, brings them in and says, ‘You’re friends with Billy, right? Before you go up to the seats you’ll be sitting in, I’d like you to come meet Gordie Howe.’
“That’s who Jim Nill is as a human. To be mentioned in a sentence with that guy and (Winnipeg Jets GM Kevin Cheveldayoff) Chevy, who I knew when I was an agent in Chicago, they’re just such smart, hard-working, great people.”
Zito’s no slouch, either.
Not that you’ll find him tapping himself on the back.
Over the 20 minutes we spent with Zito on Wednesday, he said he may have “vetoed” his staff or “freelanced” on a couple of acquisitions, but refused to say which ones. He blushed at the idea all of this was his doing, crediting his pro scouts, who were in consensus about bringing in players like Carter Verhaeghe and Gustav Forsling (“slam dunks,” as he categorized them) and effusively praising his advisors, Paul Krepelka, Brett Peterson, Sunny Mehta, Gregory Campbell, Paul Fenton, Rick Dudley, Roberto Luongo and, up until recently, Les Jackson.
Jackson was ready to walk away from hockey after 34 years with the Stars in various capacities, a role with the now-defunct Atlanta Thrashers, and some scouting with the Panthers.
But Zito called him four times to talk him out of it.
“Because he would tell me to pound sand for my own good,” Zito said. “When you have someone like Les, with his knowledge base and his character, and you know that he cares about you, you know when he tells you yes or no, black or white, red or blue, that it’s virtuous and coming from a good place, and that’s invaluable.”
Welcoming the truth, no matter its form, is a feature of being a strong leader.
Luongo has been around his fair share of them since arriving in Florida as a 21-year-old goaltender, and he recognized Zito as one as soon as he began working for him in 2020.
“He lets everyone be themselves and he is not afraid to hire or surround himself with staff that challenges him and each other,” the 46-year-old said via text Wednesday. “Collaborative approach, with no yes-men, which leads to good decisions in personnel.”
You look at the players that have landed in Florida since Zito’s been on the job, and it’s hard to find fault with that process.
“I don’t think anybody would argue he’s done a terrific job,” said Montreal Canadiens general manager Kent Hughes when we spoke to him over the phone Wednesday.
“He’s sitting on the cusp of his third straight Stanley Cup Final,” the former long-time agent continued. “The things that stand out to me are, for one, I think Billy’s had a vision for the kind of team that he wanted and the players that fit the style that he wanted to play, and two, he has a coach that would have a team play that way and coach that style of hockey and demand of it his players.
“I also think more than anything else, the consistency in how Billy has done what he’s done stands out to me. And it also stands out to me that he’s not afraid to make bold decisions and is pretty decisive about what he wants to do.”
There was an eight-year, $69-million contract for Sam Reinhart, who scored 57 goals last season and helped the Panthers win their first Cup; a six-year deal with a $5-million cap hit for Anton Lundell, who had been dynamite through his first three seasons in the league; shrewd signings of veterans Nate Schmidt, Dmitry Kulikov, and Niko Mikkola before them; Tomas Nosek and A.J. Greer brought in for pennies on the dollar; trade deadline acquisitions that did more than just add to the depth of the roster.
Right before 3:00 p.m. on Mar. 7, Zito acquired future Hall of Famer Brad Marchand from the Boston Bruins for what ended up being a 2028 first-round pick — a move he said “wasn’t a hard call” — and that was after he traded Spencer Knight and a 2026 conditional first-round pick to Chicago for minute-munching, versatile defenceman Seth Jones and got the Blackhawks to retain $2.5 million in each of the remaining five seasons on Jones’s contract.
“I wasn’t around for it, but Billy had to be all over that one with Jones,” said Jackson when we touched base with him Wednesday. “He knew him and certainly had a lot of respect for the kid’s ability and would know where he’d fit with the team and how he’d help, so he’d have led that conversation.”
It was one of many that turned the Panthers into the team they are now.
Jackson wouldn’t have agreed to be a part of all the other conversations from 2023 through 2024 had he not believed in Zito’s acumen, which was evident to him in early conversations he had with Zito back when he was working in Dallas and Zito was making his way as an agent.
“He wasn’t just one of those guys just trying to sell his players,” Jackson said. “He understood the needs of our team, and I found that refreshing. A lot of guys would call saying you need this player and that player without really understanding the depth of your organization and the internal options you had coming and others you might be looking at. Bill was always respectful that way, and he knew our organization. He sounded like he was a member of your group when you talked to him.”
As a member of Zito’s group in 2024, Jackson finally saw his name engraved on the Cup.
It was a lifetime of work was rewarded in one instant, and Jackson is forever grateful to Zito for it.
“He gave me that opportunity,” he said. “It was such a good one because it’s also about the group you work with, and Bill is so good at pulling those guys together.”
It’s a labour of love, and Zito feels fortunate to be doing it.
He made it clear it hasn’t felt like work to him at all.
“We joke about it all the time,” Zito says. “Someone will ask: ‘What are you up to?’
“I’ll say, ‘Oh, I’m going to work,’ (laughs) and work is I’ll sit around and bullshit with a couple of Hall of Famers, hang out with Paul Maurice, talk about hockey, and maybe we’ll go out as a staff and skate and shoot puck on Lou and make fun of him, and then we’ll have a five-star meal.”
There are other rewards, too, like chasing the Cup — and winning it.
Not that Zito will take credit for it.
“You can get self-interested, or selfish, or self-reflective, and then two future Hall-of-Famers like Sasha (Barkov) and Chucky (Tkachuk) walk by and you’re immediately humbled,” he says. “Imagine getting to work with them?”
There’s good fortune in that, for sure.
But Zito worked his way into that position — through his years at Yale to the ones he spent acquiring a law degree at the University of Wisconsin, through all the time he spent building his agency, and through the seven years he worked as an executive with the Columbus Blue Jackets before landing with the Panthers.
Five years into life in South Florida, the president of hockey operations and GM of the club is having as much fun as he ever has.
“You might have a better word for it, but I use the word romance to talk about all the fun of the sport and all the cool, neat things we get to experience on this side of the sport,” said Zito. “We all love hockey. I love hockey.”
It’s what makes the arena a second home for him.
