According to a team announcement, the Ottawa Senators have signed defenseman Lassi Thomson to a one-year, two-way contract for the 2025-26 NHL season. Shortly before, TSN’s Bruce Garrioch had reported that the Senators were closing in on a new deal with Thomson.
Given that it’s a two-way deal and paying Thomson a league minimum at the NHL level, the contract indicates Thomson will play in a familiar depth role next season. The former 19th overall selection of the 2019 NHL Draft is coming off a one-year deal with the SHL’s Malmö Redhawks in which he scored 17 goals and 29 points in 50 games.
There’s little expectation that Thomson will match or get close to that goal-scoring pace at the NHL level. He’s achieved a 10-goal campaign in the 2021-22 season with the AHL’s Belleville Senators, but his career minor league production sits at 24 goals and 93 points in 202 games.
His production has understandably been worse at the NHL level. Thomson played in 18 games for the Senators from 2021 to 2023, hardly enough to make a judgment call on his future worth in the sport’s top league. Still, Thomson left nothing but a poor impression in those games, tallying five assists and a -10 rating with a dreadful 84.5% on-ice save percentage at even strength.
Ottawa is hoping that a strong season overseas will help Thomson to regain some confidence as he re-enters the North American landscape. The Senators desperately needed more depth on the right side of their defensive core, and Thomson gives them a readily available option to stash in the AHL for much of the year.