As Florida Panthers president of hockey operations and general manager Bill Zito was nearing the end of a 40-plus-minute press conference last month, an all-encompassing discussion about the just-completed Olympics, the state of his team and the growth of hockey in the United States, he paused for a moment.
There was one specific topic Zito wanted to bring up before it passed him by.
“Can I just say one thing about Teddy Richards?” Zito asked.
Teddy Richards is the Panthers’ head equipment manager, a role he has held with the organization for the past decade, and he has had quite a successful past 24 months.
He won two Stanley Cups with the Panthers after also winning one as an assistant equipment manager with the Pittsburgh Penguins.
He was named Team USA’s head equipment manager for both the 4 Nations Face-Off in February 2025 and the 2026 Winter Olympics. He was a key part behind the scenes in both tournaments, with the US winning silver at 4 Nations and then beating winning just its third-ever gold medal at the Olympics and first since the Miracle on Ice team in 1980.
“Surreal is a good word,” Richards said. “You’re chasing dreams and fantasies that are somehow coming true for me.”
Richards’ job is a thankless one. Long hours behind the scenes with nearly endless responsibilities.
Since the Olympics, he’s been getting his time in the limelight — one the Panthers believe is long overdue.
“I saw he’s doing podcasts,” veteran Panthers defenseman Aaron Ekblad said. “He’s the big dog. No, it’s great to see. Obviously, a gold medal for the US team is great for them and great for Teddy and happy for him. He deserves it because of how hard he works for us.”
Added Zito: “What a great American that guy is, and what a great person he. And I know I contributed to it, but the work that he puts in day to day here, he and staff, and then what he did with Team USA. I mean, just the work and the labor is extraordinary. And I think he needs to be singled out. … I just want to say to Teddy how much we love him and appreciate him and respect what he does. He’s a pretty special guy.”
Richards, a Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania native, didn’t grow up around hockey. He played football through high school and briefly at the collegiate level at Mansfield University.
His introduction to hockey and specifically the behind-the-scenes work of the sport came in 2002 when he joined the staff of the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins, the American Hockey League affiliate of the Pittsburgh Penguins. Richards’ dad was the team’s full-time bus driver, and Richards helped out on occasion while still in high school before becoming a full-time member of the equipment staff. He was there for 11 years before joining the Pittsburgh Penguins as their assistant equipment manager in the 2013-14 season. He spent three years there, being on staff for Pittsburgh’s Stanley Cups in 2016, before the Panthers hired him.
The job was a promotion for Richards, going from the No. 2 guy in Pittsburgh to the top guy in Florida, but it was bittersweet. He left a team that won a championship — and repeated as champions the first year he was gone — while the Panthers went 35-36-11 the first season Richards was in South Florida.
Things have certainly changed — Florida has become a perennial Stanley Cup contender since Zito took over — and Richards has noticed.
“It was a tough year to come here and not make the playoffs and then see Pittsburgh — your former team — go on win. That was a tough piece, but just stayed the course. I knew we’d get our time at some point. We went through some years for sure, here in Florida. But when Bill Zito came on board and things started to change, it was an exciting time for us, for sure.”
Those exciting times keep Richards going with what is always a hectic schedule.
A typical home game day for Richards looks as follows:
Wake up around 5:15 a.m., get his morning coffee and leave his Coral Springs home by 6 a.m. to get to the Panthers’ practice facility at the Baptist Health IcePlex in Fort Lauderdale.
Ideally, he’s at the rink no later than 7 a.m., at which point he spends the next hour and a half or so sharpening skate blades.
As players start rolling in between 8:30 a.m. and 9 a.m. ahead of their 10 a.m. morning skate, Richards and his staff make sure they’re available for anything the players might need — new skates, new sticks, fixes to their equipment, “we’re there to help them,” Richards said.
“I tack on about 50 different things onto my equipment for blocking shots and stuff like that, and they’re always taking care of it,” Ekblad said. “Whether it’s skates, reworking them, whether it’s just being a friend to talk to, he’s always there. It’s nice to have good people in that room.”
After morning skate ends, they clean up the facility and pack gear up to get it ready to move over to Amerant Bank Arena for game day.
Downtime is typically between 1 p.m. and 3 p.m., at which point Richards and Co. get the dressing room prepared for the game. The work continues through puck drop and then well after the game ends.
And he has his staff always has to plan ahead, preparing for road trips and anything else that might come their way.
“These guys work so hard and don’t get the credit that they should be getting,” star Panthers winger Matthew Tkachuk said. “As players, we wouldn’t be able to do anything without them.”
That was especially true at the Olympics, where Tkachuk and Zito saw first-hand how amplified the equipment manager’s role is in that setting. Team USA only had two equipment guys with the team — Richards and Chris “Frosty” Scoppetto from the New Jersey Devils. Most NHL teams usually have at least five members on their equipment staff.
“I kind of went back to my roots,” Richards said. “Here on game nights, there’s seven or eight of us. We all pitch in. There were two of us at the Olympics. I mean, I was running up and down the ice. All that work fell on the two of us do, so you really had to make it happen and prioritize.”
Added Tkachuk: “These guys worked their asses off. It takes a village.”
The Panthers recognize that. Richards understands it. So, too, does his staff.
Richards said when he got back stateside from Italy, he came home to more than 200 American flags on his front yard and balloons in his office at the IcePlex. His staff set those up for him as a surprise.
“It really kind of stopped me in my tracks,” Richards said. “That was really cool.”
It’s why he loves what he does, even with the grind that comes with it.
“A very genuine answer is, hockey has been very good to my family,” Richards said. “We are able to we live a nice life. It’s long hours, but I think no matter what I would do in life, there’d be long hours as well. You know, my dad was a bus driver. It’s definitely not as a glamorous position, but he worked very long hours as well. But he enjoyed it, and that was able to open up doors for myself. I think that’s the biggest thing. I do enjoy it.”