Thomas Chabot Named Ottawa Senators Captain: Why He Got the C

Thomas Chabot is the new captain of the Ottawa Senators. The club named the 29-year-old defenceman its 11th captain on Tuesday, 29 September, four days before the season opener in Toronto. He replaces Brady Tkachuk, who wore the C for the past five seasons before Ottawa traded him to the Florida Panthers on 21 June.

Claude Giroux, Tim Stützle and Jake Sanderson are the alternates. Chabot is the longest-tenured player on the roster. Ottawa drafted him 18th overall in 2015, and all 569 of his NHL games have come in a Senators jersey.

Why Chabot got the C

Nobody in the organization pretended it was a close call. “I think it was an easy choice,” coach Travis Green said, adding that Chabot had been at the front of the conversation since before camp. General manager Steve Staios called the captaincy well earned and said the club had known for a long time who it would be.

Chabot found out about half an hour before the announcement, when his wife and their five-day-old daughter walked into the room. He talked about Ottawa as home, where the family bought their first house and had their first child. He grew up in Sainte-Marie, Quebec, and TSN notes he has often served as the team’s ambassador to francophone fans in the Ottawa-Gatineau region.

Thomas Chabot by the numbers

His ice time says more about his role than his point totals do. In the 2026 playoffs he had no points but averaged 31:07 a game, the most of any player in the postseason, as Carolina swept Ottawa in the first round.

Every Ottawa Senators captain

Ottawa went without a captain between Karlsson’s departure in 2018 and Tkachuk’s appointment in 2021. Alfredsson’s run, from 1999 to 2013, is by far the longest. When Chabot was named, three NHL clubs were still without a captain: Columbus, Detroit and Vancouver.

After the Tkachuk trade

The captaincy completes a summer of change. Florida paid two 2026 first-round picks (Nos. 9 and 25), a 2027 second-round pick and a conditional 2029 first for Tkachuk. Two days later Ottawa turned the ninth pick into William Eklund, Kasper Halttunen and Brandon Svoboda from San Jose, and the club also added Andre Burakovsky from Chicago. Every deal is on our NHL trade tracker.

Tkachuk played his first game for Florida on opening night, a 1-0 overtime win at Carolina in which he did not register a point.

Chabot’s first game as captain: a goal and a win in Toronto

Chabot made the first night count. In Ottawa’s opener at Scotiabank Arena on Saturday, 3 October, he scored the first goal of the game late in the first period, then set up Michael Amadio’s tying goal in the second. Stephen Halliday scored the winner midway through the third, and the Senators won 3-2. Chabot played 27:06, Claude Giroux had two assists and Linus Ullmark made 27 saves. Auston Matthews and Kirill Marchenko scored for Toronto.

Next up is a road double, at Boston tonight (7:30 p.m. ET) and at Detroit on Tuesday, before the home opener against Philadelphia on Thursday, 8 October (7 p.m. ET). Our Senators vs Maple Leafs preview set out the opening matchup, and the Ottawa Senators and Toronto Maple Leafs team pages carry both schedules and rosters. Our how to watch the NHL in Canada guide lists every channel.

For bettors, a new captain changes nothing on the scoresheet by itself. Ottawa’s futures prices will move on results, health and the goaltending, and our Stanley Cup odds page tracks the board. Odds may change. 19+ (18+ in AB/MB/QC). Please play responsibly.

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