FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Brady Tkachuk was in the stands with his family when the Florida Panthers won Stanley Cup championships in 2024 and 2025, and he couldn\u2019t help but wonder what the moment felt like down on the ice.<\/p>\n
If the Panthers win another Cup anytime soon, he\u2019ll find out.<\/p>\n
Matthew Tkachuk\u2019s brother got his formal introductory news conference from the Panthers two days after Florida landed him in a trade with the Ottawa Senators, and it was clear that sharing a locker room with his older sibling \u2014 who is about to enter his fifth year with the club \u2014 is part of the excitement surrounding this move.<\/p>\n
But it\u2019s not just the family ties that attracted Brady Tkachuk to Florida. He simply thinks this is the best place for him now.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo be a part of a Stanley Cup-winning team is something that has always been my motivation and they have the pedigree,\u201d Brady Tkachuk said. \u201cEvery time playing them, and after the game, it\u2019s all about winning. There\u2019s nothing about individuals or individual success. The sole focus in here is about excellence. And they\u2019ve shown the last bunch of years of how excellent of a team they are and their sole focus is a Stanley Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n
Brady Tkachuk \u2014 who was Ottawa\u2019s captain and expressed plenty of appreciation toward the Senators for what he learned in his eight years with that franchise \u2014 could join one of the deepest groups of forwards in the NHL.<\/p>\n
The presumed other eight top forwards on Florida\u2019s depth chart going into next season \u2014 Matthew Tkachuk, Aleksander Barkov, Brad Marchand, Sam Bennett, Sam Reinhart, Eetu Luostarinen, Anton Lundell and Carter Verhaeghe \u2014 have combined for more than 1,800 goals and nearly 2,500 assists in their careers.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know how I felt being on the other end of it, going against the depth that they have,\u201d Brady Tkachuk said. \u201cAnd every line, it\u2019s a worry out there that they can take over a game on any given night. It\u2019s not just the forwards. It\u2019s the whole entire team. They\u2019re such difference-makers … just an unbelievable team and I\u2019m excited to just get to know the guys and be part of this group.\u201d<\/p>\n
Panthers hockey operations president and general manager Bill Zito, upon hearing that answer, even pointed out that in certain scenarios Brady Tkachuk could find himself on a third line in Florida. His newest acquisition nodded in approval \u2014 knowing he\u2019s going to be surrounded by tons of talent.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat fan part of me, I\u2019m so excited just to watch the hockey,\u201d Zito said. \u201cIt\u2019s going to be a lot of fun.\u201d<\/p>\n
The trade went down on a day when the family was gathered for the baptism of Matthew Tkachuk\u2019s daughter and with their father, Keith Tkachuk, about to reveal another surprise \u2014 that he finally had been selected for induction into the Hockey Hall of Fame.<\/p>\n
A big day for the family, a big day for the team.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen a player of Brady\u2019s stature, ability, and most importantly, character becomes available, you do what you can to try to acquire players like that and fit them into the group,\u201d Zito said. \u201cWhen we had talked on the phone, I said, \u2018It\u2019s like a jigsaw puzzle and you\u2019re the piece that fits into the puzzle.\u2019 And at the same time, it\u2019s the perfect puzzle to fit around that piece. I believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Brady Tkachuk was in the stands with his family when the Florida Panthers won…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":318201,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[28,30,29],"class_list":["post-318200","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318200"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318200\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/318201"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318200"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}