With the 2026-27 NHL season kicking off at the end of the month, we’re starting to hear from players and see how they’re feeling heading into the new campaign.
It was a particularly busy and noisy summer for the Ottawa Senators, most notably involving the trade sending Brady Tkachuk to the Florida Panthers. On Tuesday, during the NHL/NHLPA Player Media Tour, Thomas Chabot was asked about it and didn’t hold back when sharing his displeasure with the former captain’s decision to leave.
“Well, it’s not fun for us as players, you know how good of a hockey player Brady is, you know, you don’t like seeing that. But like we kind of said all summer, it’s if you don’t wanna be here and you want to be somewhere else, then we’d rather it happen that way… You want guys who want to be here. You want guys to want to be part of this team and part of this city. So when you see something like that, I’d be lying to say I was happy when he decided to leave. No, that’s not true. He’s a heck of a hockey player and you want guys to stick around, and we felt like we’re on the verge of starting to make playoffs and building something. And you know what, that was his decision,”
The 26-year-old Tkachuk was, of course, dealt from Ottawa to Florida for a package of three first-round draft picks, one of which the Senators flipped to acquire William Eklund from the Sharks, along with a second-round pick.
Chabot and Tkachuk spent eight years together as teammates and core pieces of the team in Ottawa, so you can understand the former having a tough time dealing with it all, especially given that the Senators finally appeared to be on the upswing coming out of their lengthy rebuild.
The longtime teammates turned division rivals won’t have to wait long to face off for the first time, with Tkachuk’s much-anticipated return to Ottawa set to come on Wednesday, October 21.
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