Brady Tkachuk’s first game back with the Ottawa Senators wasn’t an easy one.
The Senators captain returned to the nation’s capital riding the high of a gold medal with Team USA at the Olympics, but his on-ice performance hasn’t been the headline.
Earlier this week, Tkachuk was one of 20 American players who visited the White House and attended the State of the Union following an invitation from President Donald Trump.
But what many Canadian and Senators fans took issue with was an AI-doctored video shared by the White House that made it appear he was disparaging Canadians. The altered clip, shared by the White House's TikTok account, inserted fabricated audio of Tkachuk referring to Canadians as “maple syrup eating f---s,” with the expletive bleeped in the video. The video carries a note saying it “contains AI-generated media.”
“It’s clearly fake because it’s not my voice and not my lips moving,” Tkachuk said following the Senators morning skate. “I’m not in control of any of those accounts. … I know that those words would never come out of my mouth.”
The rest of the day didn’t get any easier for Tkachuk.
During the first TV timeout against the Detroit Red Wings the Senators showed video of all its players and staff who competed or worked at the Olympics, ending with Tkachuk and Jake Sanderson.
The display earned an equal amount of boos and cheers.
Tkachuk did earn the support of the home crowd when he opened the scoring with a power-play goal late in the first period.
The captain was once again in the middle of things midway through the second period.
Tkachuk was watching the play and when he went to turn up ice Simon Edvinsson stepped into him. Tkachuk's own stick hit him in the face, dropping him to the ice.
Dylan Cozens jumped to his captain’s defence and both Edvinsson and Cozens were sent to the box.
“I just didn’t see him and just felt like he lowered his shoulder on me,” Tkachuk said.
Tkachuk returned to the ice before play resumed and skated to the penalty box to confront Edvinsson drawing a 10-minute misconduct.
“I didn’t know that was like an auto 10-minute,” admitted Tkachuk. “I was just expressing my frustration. I didn’t realize that would be a 10-minute.
"Definitely wouldn’t have done it that way if I knew I was gonna get a 10-minute.”
Head coach Travis Green wasn’t a fan of how things played out.
“I don’t want him to be in the box for 10 minutes,” Green said. “You don’t see that call made very often.”
The Senators played a solid game but fell 2-1 in overtime, giving up a crucial two points to a division rival.
Ottawa (28-22-8) is now sit seven points back of the Boston Bruins for the final wild card in the Eastern Conference.
“I definitely felt that we deserved a better result,” said Tkachuk. “I thought we did a lot of great things (Thursday). Their goalie stood on his head and played a great game and just unfortunate we didn’t get the two points that we wanted.”
The Senators schedule doesn’t get any easier as they prepare for a five-game road trip. With the NHL trade deadline set for March 6, Ottawa doesn't have much time to prove its a contender.
“We’ve got to worry about just our own destiny, our own game,” said Green. “We’re going to lose some games. We got a point out of (Thursday), probably should have got two. All you can do is play and play well.”
Picture Courtesy: AP Photo/Marta Lavandier
