Zito 'very, very confident' Panthers can find value in 2022 NHL Draft

MONTREAL -It's time for scouts to flex their metaphorical muscles.
With a year's worth of hard work boiling down to just two days, the Panthers are confident that their shrewd pool of talent evaluators will once again be able to unearth a few diamonds in the rough over the course of the team's six selections at the 2022 NHL Draft in Montreal this week.

"These guys work so hard," Panthers General Manager Bill Zito said of his scouts. "You see them all year long with the amount of travel and work and the games they go to, and you read the reports. I feel very, very confident. Even in meetings you can see how prepared they are."
Round 1 of the NHL Draft will kick off on Thursday at 7 p.m. ET with coverage on ESPN+ and ESPN, while Rounds 2-7 will be on Friday starting at 11 a.m. ET on ESPN+ and NHL Network.
At the moment, the Panthers don't have picks in the first or second round. Their first-round pick was shipped to the Sabres in exchange for Sam Reinhart at last year's draft, while their second-round pick was dealt to the Flames in order to acquire Sam Bennett at the deadline in 2020-21.
Both home-run deals, Reinhart and Bennett combined for 61 goals this season.
While Zito didn't rule out the possibility of trading back into an earlier round of the draft if a deal presented itself, the Panthers currently aren't slated to be on the clock until the third round with the 93rd overall pick. Additionally, they have one pick in the fourth (125th overall), one in the fifth (157th overall), two in the sixth (186th and 189th overall) and one in the seventh (221st overall).
Even though the waiting game is never fun on draft day, the Panthers have proved in two drafts under Zito that talent can be found well beyond the first round. Taking a look at some of the top prospects within the organization's pipeline, Justin Sourdif (87th overall) and Mike Benning (95th overall) were selected in 2020, while Kirill Gerasimyuk (152nd overall) was discovered in 2021.
This past season, Sourdif was an integral part of Edmonton's championship squad in the WHL, Benning was named the "Most Outstanding Player" at the Frozen Four after helping Denver to its ninth NCAA title, and Gerasimyuk went 16-0-1 while manning the crease in Russia's MHL.
Just like this year's draft, finding those players was the culmination of countless hours of work.
"It's no surprise," Zito said. "If you asked Jason Day the golfer 'Were you surprised you made that put?' He'd say, 'No, I've made it 1,000 times before.' That's how hard [these scouts] work."
It's also important to remember that teams aren't built solely on the backs of high draft picks.
In fact, four of Florida's top-10 scorers this past season were selected after the third round, including Carter Verhaeghe (82nd overall, 2013) and MacKenzie Weegar (206th overall, 2013).
Overall, here's a rundown of what the Cats will be working with at the draft this week.
With the offseason really starting to ramp up, the Panthers will only have a few days to relax after the draft before the NHL's free agency period opens on July 13. As of right now, Zito said he's already had initial conversations with the agents of all of the team's impending free agents.
As for which deals will and won't get done, only time will tell.
But as they start to make all of the necessary adjustments in order to take another step forward after winning the Presidents' Trophy and advancing to the second round of the playoffs this past season, there's really no question that the Panthers are already itching to drop the puck again.
"I think if you talk to most of the people associated with our team, we're ready to get back it," Zito said. "Players are excited to keep going and build on what we started. We'll be ready."
To stay up to date on this year's draft, follow @FlaPanthers and @JamesonCoop on Twitter.