By Elina Ellis
Hockey is usually all about the on-ice action, but the Ottawa Senators have been making off-ice plays since the late 1990s. Current and former players have led charitable initiatives to support children across Ottawa and around the globe.
Over the past two decades, Senators players have helped raise and contribute hundreds of thousands of dollars, and in some cases millions, for children’s hospitals, mental health programs, youth recreation, education initiatives, and families facing difficult circumstances.
While those numbers are impressive, the true impact is measured not in dollars but in lives touched. For a child waiting for treatment, a family struggling to make ends meet, or a young athlete who otherwise couldn’t afford to play, support from a local sports hero can mean far more than financial assistance. It can provide hope, encouragement, confidence, and the feeling that someone cares.
The following child-focused initiatives, led by Ottawa Senators players between 2004 and 2026, demonstrate how athletes can make a meaningful difference beyond the game and help make Ottawa a better city for everyone.
Ottawa Senators captain Thomas Chabot and centre Tim Stützle announced their 18|72 Club this October.
The new CHEO ambassadors pledged to donate $1,872 to the foundation’s Kids These Days campaign for every win this season.
Chabot and Stützle encouraged fans to join the club and donate $18.72 through their website. The donation can be made as a one-time gift or as a pledge for every Sens win.
The two accredited their campaign to six-year-old Griffin Bell, who passed away in 2024 from a pediatric cancer called Neuroblastoma.
In an article with the Ottawa Senators Hockey Club, Chabot said that he and the team became close with the Bell family. Stützle added that they wanted to support families facing similar hardships.
So did a lot of Sens fans.
Steve Read, President and CEO of the CHEO Foundation, says hundreds of people have joined the club.
Kids These Days is the foundation’s largest campaign. The $220 million fundraiser will support a 10-year series of redevelopment projects. One of which is an Integrated Treatment Centre.
“About four years ago, the hospital recognized that it needed to evolve and grow,” Read said. “It is too small for the population it serves,” he added.
While everyone can donate to CHEO directly, Read says the 18|72 Club incentivizes donors with custom hats, a message from Chabot and Stützle and some extra team spirit.
“Knowing that each win has a direct impact on kids and families is another reason to watch the games and cheer [the Senators] on,” Read said.
The Ottawa Senators have won eight games so far. There will be at least $14,976 in donations from Chabot and Stützle at the end of the 2026 to 2027 season.
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2025: Linus Ullmark’s Bauer Auction
Ottawa Senators goalie Linus Ullmark brought gear to an online auction block in 2025. It sold custom Bauer Hockey gear to support, a Swedish non-profit organization, AjaBajaCancer.
Ullmark helped design a set of pads, a glove, and a waffle board that were customized with the names of children diagnosed with cancer.
He said in an online statement, “I wish we could catch or block cancer. We can’t. But we can offer some relief to families.”
The goaltender became an ambassador for AjaBajaCancer after his agent, Joakim Persson of KMJ Sports, said he had chosen him for the role.
“[Ullmark] has a big heart,” Persson said. “He’s very social and outgoing– he can connect with so many different people.”
Persson says the auction raised USD $10,000 for AjaBajaCancer to support families with children battling cancer by removing daily stressors.
“These parents can’t go to the grocery store or go to work; they have to stay with their children at the hospitals,” Persson said. “It’s about making life easier for these families,” he added.
But Ullmark’s involvement goes beyond fundraising. From 30-second cameos to meet-and-greets, Persson says Ullmark dedicates a lot of time to the families at AjaBajaCancer during his off-season.
“[Ullmark] wants to do everything he can to support those kids and their families,” he said.
Former Ottawa Senators captain Brady Tkachuk introduced Brady’s Skate for Kids at Ottawa’s rink of dreams around 2023. He and his wife, Emma Tkachuk, hosted the skate for members of the Ottawa’s Boys and Girls Club (BGC).
Every January, hundreds of kids from the BGC joined Senators players and their families to skate together, says their CEO Adam Joiner.
“It is an opportunity for these kids to network and learn something new.”
BGC is a recreation centre with four locations across Ottawa. It is open to 6-to 18-year-old members year-round. They host after-school and summer camp programs, along with events, like Brady’s Skate for Kids.
The club provided transportation and staffing for the skate, but said they were supported by the Senators Community Foundation throughout the process.
Joiner says the club’s relationship with the Ottawa Senators dates to around 1992. He says he remembers meeting Ottawa Senators players at the BGC when he was a member at age 9.
“To be able to provide even a fraction of the experiences I got as a kid means a lot to me,” Joiner said.
He says Brady’s Skate for Kids is a “down-to-earth” event.
Kids hop on a bus and travel down to Ottawa City Hall. The Ottawa Senators and their families pour into the rink of dreams where they sign autographs, teach some tricks and skate with the children.
“You can see the starstruck look in the kids’ eyes when they first see the players,” said Joiner.
Tkachuk was traded to the Florida Panthers this summer; it is unclear whether another player will step in to carry on the Skate for Kids event.
In 2014, Ottawa Senators winger Bobby Ryan purchased a private suite at the Canadian Tire Centre that could accommodate 16 people.
For its first season, Ryan invited children and families from the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) to watch the game from the All-Star Kids’ suite. The Ottawa Sun states the suite would host different organizations each season.
An article from the National Hockey League’s Player Association (NHLPA) said Ryan’s initiative gave these children a memorable night which they might not have had without his efforts.
Ottawa Senators’ coach, Roger Neilson, passed away in 2003 after being diagnosed with bone marrow cancer in 1999, and skin cancer in 2001. Three years later, the Senators Community Foundation and the Children’s Hospital of Eastern Ontario (CHEO) built the Roger Neilson Children’s Hospice.
“It was only fitting that [Neilson’s] name be lent to a facility that was going to help so many children and families,” said Chad Schella, a director at the Senators Community Foundation at the time.
Schella says he saw Neilson’s contributions firsthand in the late 1980s while working at his hockey school in Port Hope, ON.
Neilson acted as a father figure to teenage Schella. He says Neilson played this role for many others as well.
Neilson was known as an innovative coach in the National Hockey League (NHL), leveraging grey areas in the league’s official rules and guidelines. This earned him the nickname “Rule Book Roger,” according to the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Despite his success, Neilson would run hockey camps, schools and coaches clinics during the off-season. McMaster University’s website says excess revenue from Neilson’s efforts was put towards scholarships or hockey needs.
Schella says there is a generation that remembers these contributions, but the new generation has no clue.
“In addition to the just incredible work that [the hospice] does, it’s also helping keep Roger’s legacy alive,” Schella said.
Roger Neilson Children’s Hospice has provided children and families with end-of-life care for 20 years. Schella is now a board member at the hospice and says it has expanded to include grief counselling and other forms of support.
“It’s one of those places you wish you never need, but take comfort knowing that it’s there if you do need it.”
In 2006, ten-year-old Ottawa Senators fan Colin Champagne says he achieved a perfect score on his Spelling with Spezza test. He was awarded a once-in-a-lifetime experience that he still remembers, twenty years later.
Spelling with Spezza was an educational initiative launched by Jason Spezza in the early 20o0’s. The hope was to encourage education with prizes: two free tickets to an Ottawa Senators game and a Jason Spezza poster, according to an archived article from The Iroquois Chieftain.
31-year-old Champagne says he still remembers when his mom and Spartacat, the official Ottawa Senators mascot, presented him with Sens tickets at First Avenue Public School. He says his class was excited and his friends were a little jealous.
At first, Champagne said he expected a regular game. But after the second period, he said he and his father sat with the scorekeeper behind the opposing team’s goalie.
He said the highlight of the game was meeting Jason Spezza, Chris Neil and other players on the team. Champagne says Spezza encouraged him to study hard.
“At the time, Spezza was like an idol, and I was starstruck,” said Champagne.
Spelling with Spezza was available to Ottawa and Gatineau schools, at their discretion, during the season. The initiative likely wrapped up around 2014, coinciding with Spezza’s trade to the Dallas Stars.
Photo Credits: Thomas Chabot and Tim Stützle via Senators Foundation Instagram; Linus Ullmark via Ottawa Senators Instagram; Brady’s Skate for Kids, Courtesy National Players Association; Ottawa Senators’ Coach, Roger Neilson, Courtesy Roger Neilson Children’s Hospice; Bobby Ryan via Ottawa Senators Facebook, 2020; Jason Spezza via Ottawa Senators Facebook, 2013.
