Don’t be confused when you start seeing life-sized panthers popping up all over South Florida this summer.
Sure, the defending Stanley Cup champions have grown their brand in their market. But this is about so much more.
Cancer has hit home too many times for Bill Zito, the general manager and president of hockey operations for the Florida Panthers. He lost his sister, his mother and his mother-in-law to the disease, all in a brief period several years ago.
Zito’s wife, Julie, meanwhile, is a breast cancer survivor, and it’s because of her fight that back in 2019, while still with the Columbus Blue Jackets front office, Zito trained for a bike race to help raise awareness — a moment The Athletic’s Blue Jackets beat writer Aaron Portzline beautifully chronicled.
Fast forward to Zito’s move to South Florida after he became GM of the Panthers in September 2020: Zito and his wife got involved in a couple of different initiatives, one involving the Panthers for a breast cancer awareness night. Now it’s gone to the next level after Zito and Julie were asked to be co-chairs of the American Cancer Society campaign in South Florida.
The answer was yes, and it got Zito thinking about what he could do to help raise funds that would be different than just plainly asking people…
