Breaking News: NHL Reverses Forfeiture of Senators 1st-Round Pick for Dadonov Trade

The Ottawa Senators are breathing a big sigh of relief today, as the NHL has announced that the team will no longer lose their first-round pick in the 2026 Draft over the Evgenii Dadonov trade controversy of a few years back. Instead, the penalty has been revised so that the Sens will receive the 32nd and final pick of the first round and are not eligible for the Draft Lottery to change that position. They cannot trade that pick, and they will also pay a $1 million fine.

#NHL announces that it has restored the #GoSensGo 1st round pick that was originally forfeited as penalty for the Evgenii Dadonov trade misstep.

There are stipulations: Ottawa will pick 32nd overall. Cannot trade it or win Draft Lottery. And will pay $1 million fine. pic.twitter.com/yvAgRiLFWs
— Frank Seravalli (@frank_seravalli) March 12, 2026

The $1 Million fine will be directed to the NHL Foundation Canada.

Insider Pierre LeBrun reports that the Senators had been working hard behind the scenes in lobbying the NHL for a while now to get them to ease up on the original punishment of losing their first-round pick.

According to the NHL's statement, the decision to make this move was driven by the Senators' ownership, who pointed out that the Dadonov incident occurred under former ownership and management. "After due and thorough consideration," the league decided to retract the complete forfeiture of the pick.

As a result of Ottawa's placement now at the bottom of the first round, all teams that would have been behind the Sens in the draft order get a bonus and will move up a spot.

What was the Dadonov trade screw-up?

When trading Dadonov to the Vegas Golden Knights in 2021, Ottawa failed to provide the Knights with the list of 10 teams the player had submitted to them, to which he could not be traded. Vegas, unaware of the list, subsequently traded Dadonov to the Anaheim Ducks in March 2022. The NHL voided that trade because the Ducks were on Dadonov's 10-team no-trade list.

The NHL initially resolved that by ruling that the Senators would forfeit a first-round pick in either the 2024, 2025, or 2026 NHL Drafts. The team had pushed it to this year while they lobbied behind the scenes to get a result like they got today.