An absolute blockbuster has taken place as the Florida Panthers have acquired Ottawa Senators captain Brady Tkachuk. The inner-divisional trade has been confirmed by Florida and Ottawa.
In exchange for the face of their franchise, Ottawa takes both the ninth and 25th overall selections in this Friday’s draft, along with another first-rounder in 2029, and finally a second-round pick in 2027. The Athletic’s Chris Johnston reports that the 2029 first-round selection carries top-10 protection. The return is entirely draft capital, meaning the club is slated for three top selections in Buffalo shortly; 9th, 25th, and 32nd. According to TSN’s Pierre LeBrun, the Sens weren’t always intent on such a futures-focused package, trying to bring back Anton Lundell, whom Florida didn’t budge on.
Finally with an end to the saga which has dragged on for some time, finding a new home for the 26-year-old star who was rumored to be wanting out for the last two years, they also shed his $8.2MM cap hit, giving general manager Steve Staios around $25MM in cap space to work with on a team still intent on contention in 2026-27. As his contract expires in two years, if Tkachuk was to reluctantly stay in Canada’s capital city, the noise would have only kept rising all while his trade value diminished.
For the Panthers, their trade of Mackie Samoskevich earlier today netted the 25th overall pick from Seattle, thought to be a bargaining chip of some capacity. Few would have anticipated it to come into play just hours later in a deal of this magnitude. Having a top 10 selection at the podium one summer after their back-to-back Stanley Cups was never the plan, but it became a huge asset. Rather than drafting a prospect who would need a few years to make an impact, they’ve gone out and gotten who very well could be the biggest name they possibly could have acquired, uniting the elite 6’4″ winger with his brother, Matthew.
Since being drafted fourth overall by the Sens in 2018, Tkachuk has risen into one of the game’s premier power forwards. Always bringing relentless physical traits and net-front abilities, he broke out in 2022-23 surpassing the point-per-game mark for the first time with 83 points in 82 games. The output showcased his flourishing play-driving capability, far more than just a net-front presence who bangs home rebounds. Things haven’t come so easily since then, not meeting the 80-point mark since, and playing in 60 regular season contests as a result of a wrist injury in October. Even then, he came away from the past season with 59 points as a player already right among the NHL’s best, and still having yet to reach his full potential.
In the playoffs the Senators went out quietly to the eventual champion Carolina Hurricanes, but even if Tkachuk was not filling the score sheet due to his ailments, he still couldn’t be missed, dropping the mitts with Jordan Staal off the opening face-off of the series.
There are plenty of parallels with his brother, the duo able to affect the game in similar ways. Still, Brady is different from Matthew in that he’s more of a shoot-first, straight-line player. Always a wild possibility to imagine them able to play together, like they have done for Team USA in the past, highlighted by the unforgettable gold medal win over Team Canada, Zito has pulled it off. Decimating his draft assets when it’s already very thin in their farm system, imagining the duo wreaking havoc across the Atlantic Division, along with Sam Bennett and Brad Marchand, to go with healthy stars in Aleksander Barkov and Sam Reinhart, Florida fans will be happy to worry about prospect rankings some time later. With the Tkachuks set to play together on a daily basis now, rather than just on the international circuit, they’ll make an impact reminiscent of Daniel and Henrik Sedin of the last era.
Content to finally move on from what was a distraction in Ottawa throughout 2025-26 and even before that, there was still little warning that the deal would materialize so early in the summer. Less than two months ago in his end-of-season press conference, Tkachuk shot down trade rumors, speaking to his commitment to the team, and saying the speculation was “getting frustrating”. It turns out that was not so much the case, as LeBrun reported that he ultimately had four teams on a list, wanting to join his brother as the #1 most favorable scenario, with Minnesota, Carolina, and Vegas also in the mix.
In terms of the Wild, known to be big-game hunting this summer, Michael Russo of The Athletic confirmed Minnesota’s efforts to acquire Tkachuk, no stranger to league-shaking deals after their trade for Quinn Hughes. Russo says that they made a “huge offer” but Brady’s preference to play with his brother, of whom he co-hosts a podcast titled “Wingmen” with, was too much to pass up. Regardless of any long-term ramifications, Florida swooped in to make it happen, and they’ll be serious contenders for a third title in the next few years.
Left over with just over $7MM of cap space, Zito’s Panthers figure to be out of the running for fellow gold medalists they’d been linked to in Dylan Larkin and Connor Hellebuyck. Besides minor signings to round out depth, there’s still one big item on their checklist; goaltending. Both Sergei Bobrovsky and Daniil Tarasov are set to hit the open market on July 1. Between re-upping the 37-year-old Bobrovsky or shopping for someone new like Stuart Skinner, today’s trade for Tkachuk limits them to more mundane options. Now that they’re more thin on the cap front, the best option could be trying to get Bobrovsky on a team-friendly deal and hoping he has what it takes to backstop the high flying team while approaching age 40. All that to say, if there’s one possible weakness that stands out on Florida’s roster going into 2026-27, it’s between the pipes.
Based on the situation which has some resemblance to Calgary’s difficulty in retaining Matthew four years ago, before his own trade to the Sunshine State, Ottawa finds themselves with a haul of draft picks and plenty of time to figure out how to proceed. Most advantageous from the assets they got is the flexibility in what comes next, opposite to what the Flames brought on for Brady’s brother. The trade return looks like the first step of a tear-down, but the Sens will do no such thing, with a forward corps led by Tim Stutzle which is still intact for another season. Boasting two premier defensemen in Jake Sanderson and Thomas Chabot, Ottawa is thought to be needing a top-four righty. They’re in luck with abundant options to choose from, but now with a massive hole in their top six and plenty of cap room, one has to wonder if the Senators will make a run at free agent Alex Tuch, or leverage their draft capital to seek out a Tkachuk-esque replacement elsewhere on the trade market.
The Panthers hardly had a shot to defend their back-to-back Stanley Cups this past season, losing Barkov on a devastating knee injury before the puck even dropped on opening night. Dealing with several more issues and never able to ice a lineup anywhere near full strength, the struggles paved the way for the addition of another superstar, as the Tkachuks will be must-watch for years to come.
TSN’s Pierre LeBrun broke the news that the deal was close, while Elliotte Friedman of Sportsnet was the first to officially confirm the trade.
Image Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images and Geoff Burke-Imagn Images
