Brady Tkachuk Picked No. 8 for the Panthers. His Dad’s Reaction Says It All.

The Florida Panthers just got a whole lot more Tkachuk. Brady Tkachuk was officially introduced as a Panther on Tuesday after the team acquired him from the Ottawa Senators. He’ll wear No. 8. And yeah, he didn’t just pick a random number.

“For me, we joke around,” Tkachuk said at his press conference. “I definitely see myself as a single-digit guy. My dad wore 8 in Atlanta, so I thought it could be a tribute to him as well.”

That dad is Keith Tkachuk, who is getting inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame this weekend. So the timing works out pretty nicely. Keith did not hold back when asked about it all.

“It’s been a great weekend for the Tkachuks,” Keith told ESPN. “It’s been a crazy weekend, but this tops it off. This is the ultimate, for sure.”

Brady joins his brother Matthew in Florida

The real story here is brothers playing together. Brady and Matthew Tkachuk are now teammates in Florida. Matthew has been with the Panthers since 2022. The Panthers won back-to-back Stanley Cups in 2024 and 2025, then missed the playoffs entirely in 2026. So this is a reload, not a rebuild.

Brady said he felt the chemistry right away.

“I feel like it’s the closest group in the league, everybody is just doing stuff together,” he said. “Everybody is a part of the puzzle. Their sole focus is winning.”

A look at what Brady brings

Last season Brady put up 59 points for the Senators. He helped them get to the playoffs, but they lost to Carolina. In his career he has 463 regular season points. He spent his whole career in Ottawa before this move.

The Panthers put out a note saying Tkachuk has reached 20 goals in seven of his eight NHL seasons. He had three straight 30-goal seasons from 2021-22 to 2023-24. That kind of consistency matters for a team that suddenly looks dangerous again.

Panthers fans are buzzing. The Tkachuk brothers together? That’s a lot of physical play, a lot of grit, and honestly a lot of personality. Florida’s front office clearly thinks the window is still open, and they’re not wrong. Adding a guy like Brady Tkachuk to a roster that still has Matthew, Aleksander Barkov, and Sergei Bobrovsky? That’s a lineup that can win now.

No word yet on jersey sales, but something tells us No. 8 will be everywhere in Sunrise pretty soon.