The Ottawa Senators have traded top forward Jean-Gabriel Pageau for draft picks.
Before the NHL’s 3 p.m. ET trade deadline Monday, the rebuilding Senators dealt Pageau to the New York Islanders.
Hours later, the Islanders signed Pageau to a six-year extension with an average annual value of US$5 million.
Pageau, Ottawa’s leading scorer this season with a career-high 24 goals to go along with 16 assists in 60 games, was considered one of the top players potentially available on the market. The Senators received a conditional first-round pick in 2020, a second-round selection in 2020 and a conditional third-rounder in 2022 for the Ottawa native.
The 2020 pick will slide to 2021 if it falls in the top-3 at June’s draft, while the third-round selection in 2022 will only be heading to the nation’s capital if the Islanders win the Stanley Cup this spring.
A fourth-round selection by Ottawa (96th overall) in 2011, Pageau made his NHL debut during the 2012-13 season. He had 182 points (87 goals, 95 assists) in 428 games with the team.
The 27-year-old centre added 16 points in 35 playoff games, including eight goals and two assists in 2017 when Ottawa made it to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference final.
The Senators also scooped up a pair of draft picks for two pending unrestricted free-agent forwards — a fourth-rounder in 2021 from the Colorado Avalanche for Vladislav Namestnikov and a fifth-rounder in the same draft from the Edmonton Oilers for Tyler Ennis.
The club sent a fourth-round pick and minor-league defenceman Nick Ebert to the New York Rangers to acquire Namestnikov, 27, in October.
Ennis, 30, signed a one-year deal with the Senators over the summer.
Namestnikov has 13 goals and 25 points in 56 games this season. Ennis, meanwhile, has put up 14 goals and 33 in 61 contests.
Ottawa (20-30-11) currently has the third-worst record in the league, but should have two lottery picks this year — their own and the one acquired from the San Jose Sharks in the Erik Karlsson trade in September 2018 — and could have as many as 13 selections, including seven in the first two rounds.
With their forward ranks short-handed, the Senators acquired Matthew Peca from the Montreal Canadiens for minor-league centre Aaron Luchuk and a seventh-round pick this year later Monday.
Peca didn’t have a point in five games with the Canadiens this season. He has four goals and nine assists in 34 games with Laval of the American Hockey League.
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