- Shane Pinto says the Brady Tkachuk trade “took everyone kinda by surprise”
- Ottawa shipped its captain to Florida for a haul of draft picks
- Read below for Pinto’s full reaction and what the Senators got back
Shane Pinto is still wrapping his head around losing his captain.
The Senators center talked about Brady Tkachuk’s trade to the Florida Panthers on TSN 1200, and he didn’t dress it up.
“Took everyone kinda by surprise. He’s been such a big part of this organization – obviously the face of it. He’s obviously one of my good buds too so to see him go, it sucks,” Pinto said.
The interesting part is the timing. Reports swirled all offseason about tension in the Ottawa room late last season, so hearing a teammate say the move blindsided him raises an eyebrow.
The deal itself wasn’t a shock to most. Tkachuk was always going to end up next to his brother Matthew at some point, and after winning Olympic gold in February he wanted a real crack at a deep playoff run.
Ottawa didn’t walk away empty. The Senators pulled in a stack of picks, headlined by the ninth and 25th selections in this year’s draft, plus a first-rounder in 2029 and a second in 2027.
Then general manager Steve Staios flipped that ninth pick to San Jose for William Eklund, a 22-year-old winger who now has a big role to fill in Tkachuk’s absence.
Fans in the capital already had their moment with the split, right down to a jersey trade-in promotion the team ran after the deal.
Now Ottawa heads into 2026-27 without a captain for the first time since Tkachuk got the letter in 2021. Pinto and the rest of the room find out soon whether the haul was worth losing the face of the franchise.
