FORT LAUDERDALE — By Sunday night, even as the gold-medal celebration swirled in Milan, Bill Zito began moving on. This always was the bargain. Team USA’s assistant general manager helped construct a generational hockey win against Canada in the Olympics …
“It was so exciting, so humbling,’’ he said.
… and now became the Florida Panthers general manager again.
“How do we get guys back home?” he began thinking. “What’s are we doing? What’s happening? Guys who had left are trickling back into town ….”
Several Panthers players were making that overnight turn from the Olympics to the NHL, too, even as Matthew Tkachuk spent an extra Monday night with U.S. teammates celebrating on South Beach. A double-decker bus. A late-night rendition of “The Star-Spangled Banner” in the nightclub, E11EVEN. All good. All deserved, as Zito knew.
“I had a great conversation with (U.S. and Vegas Knights center) Jack Eichel, and he said, ‘What do you think of this whole thing?’ ” Zito said. “I said, ‘What do you think?’ He said, ‘I think we’re a team. I’ve known these guys since …’ — we talked about how long and maybe it was 2010 with the U.S. developmental team.
“When you look at champions, you find a team every time. How hard is it for any of us — a sports agency or law firm or guy with a company — to build a great team.”
There was the overlap Zito recognized between the U.S. team and, “those guys down the hall,’’ Zito said, throwing a thumb toward the Panthers locker room.
By Tuesday, Latvian forward Sandis Vilmanis was the first Olympian back at Panthers practice. The Finnish Panthers, the Canadian Panthers and Tkachuck — seven players in all — played through last weekend and so won’t join the team until the Thursday morning skate, just hours before the must-win game against Toronto.
That’s right. Must-win. If it’s odd to say the two-time champs skate for these stakes in Game 58, it’s odder still to say Friday’s game against Buffalo also seems like a must-win game, too.
Both games are at home. Both Toronto and Buffalo are ahead of the Panthers in the standings — and Toronto isn’t in the playoffs now, either.
The good news is finally some cavalry is coming. Defenseman Dmitri Kulikov and fourth-liners Johan Gadovich and Tomas Nosek, out for months, are practicing and could play again starting Thursday. Star defenseman Seth Jones is practicing in a non-contact yellow jersey, suggesting he’s close to returning.
That leaves only Aleksander Barkov out until maybe the playoffs. If there are playoffs. Maybe it’s all a lesson in the difficulty of three-peat. Maybe that’s conclusions we end up with after this bad-health, bad-luck season. Maybe the March 6 trade deadline will tell just what the Panthers’ realistic goal is this season.
Two Herculean tasks face the Panthers now. The first is playing 25 games in 49 days. Every team plays something similar. Not every team needs to win like the Panthers, though. They sit with 61 points and have to climb over five teams to get a playoff spot.
Boston and the New York Islanders currently hold the seventh and final eighth playoff spot with 69 points. The Panthers play at the Islanders on Sunday. Another must win? The Panthers, you see, don’t just have to win, but can’t lose against certain teams.
“This is a veteran team that clearly understands what’s ahead of us,’’ coach Paul Maurice said. “We don’t have 25 games left. We have 25, one games left. You really narrow your focus and don’t get ahead of yourself. Like the playoffs, don’t carry a loss into the next day. Cut it off and move on.”
It all starts up again for the Panthers after something special ended for a couple of them. The beauty was more than just winning the gold after years of work, as Zito saw it.
“We go through life and look back with appreciation on certain events and certain opportunities when we reflect on them,’’ he said. “In this instance, it was in the moment. We appreciated the things that were happening while they were happening. That made it a little deeper experience. ‘Wow, were we lucky.’
“The other thing was an appreciation, I’m saying this sincerely, of what we have here. Of the similarities and how special our group is.”
The Panthers team that Zito has built is everything you want in an organization, minus some health this season. The question now is if there’s any magic left to help this season on the brink.
Florida Panthers president of Hockey Operations & general manager Bill Zito speaks during a news conference at the Baptist Health IcePlex in Fort Lauderdale on Tuesday. (Amy Beth Bennett / South Florida Sun Sentinel)
