Yes, a building screaming "fuck your podcast" at a guy's bench proves Ottawa has a passionate, elite fanbase, and anyone still pretending otherwise is confusing manners with a pulse. On October 21, 2026, Brady Tkachuk came back to Canadian Tire Centre for the first time since his trade, and the sold-out crowd booed him with a script.
Think about the work involved. "We don't need you." "Traitor." "Little brother." "You eat crayons." "Brady's balding." "Timmy's better." "Sellout." And the keeper, "fuck your podcast," timed to a penalty kill. That's a fanbase that mentally drafted a set list over the summer and executed it in unison across three periods. Passion that never crosses a line is just politeness, and nobody buys a ticket for that.
The podcast line is smarter than it sounds. Tkachuk now plays in Florida alongside his brother and "Wingmen" co-host Matthew. Elliotte Friedman reported before the trade that multiple Ottawa players had grown weary of the show, particularly after the 2026 Olympics, and that one player told him it had caused issues in the room. So when the crowd went after "Wingmen," they were amplifying a grudge the locker room reportedly already had. They'd been paying attention.
RatingTkachuk built this night. He requested the trade in the spring of 2026 after years as captain, got dealt in June, and the split read as acrimonious. He gave Ottawa a villain and then kept talking into a microphone. The Senators, for some reason, decided to play a glowing video tribute as he took the ice for Florida, in a building that had already decided to hate him. The crowd answered by raining boos straight through it. If you want a culprit for the vulgarity, start with the man who handed them the material.
One loud, crude night doesn't erase whatever attendance and engagement questions have followed this market for years, and "you can't read" isn't exactly a civic achievement. But the scoreboard backed the noise. Entering the game the Senators sat at 6-3-0 and the Panthers at 5-2-2, close company despite Ottawa losing its captain, and on this night it wasn't close at all. Tkachuk scored on an early power play while the crowd buried him in boos. Tim Stützle answered about four minutes later, and the rest belonged to Ottawa. The only sour note was Linus Ullmark, the club's early-season MVP, leaving with a lower-body injury on what should have been a routine save.
Then came the pettiest flourish of the whole evening. Fans chucked old Tkachuk jerseys onto the ice, which he'd already waved off by announcing they'd go to charity. After the win, the Senators piped his personal theme song, "Mr. Brightside," through the dressing room on a loop. The crowd and the team were telling the same joke all night.
Tkachuk, to his credit, got it. "Were they ruthless? It was good," he said. "It shows the passion that they have. One chapter closed." The man on the receiving end understood what everyone squinting at the clip from a distance missed. Ottawa showed up and won the night, on the ice and off it. You don't fake that.
