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NHL NHL Regular Season Carter Yakemchuk scored his first NHL goal against the Detroit Red Wings on Tuesday. Jaime Crawford / Getty Images Talk about a high-pressure situation to jump into, if you’re a 20-year-old NHL rookie like Carter Yakemchuk. Yakemchuk was watching the Ottawa Senators from his home in Belleville, Ont. , on Monday night. The Senators got a win over the New York Rangers, but at a cost. They lost two defencemen, Thomas Chabot and Lassi Thomson, to injury, growing their list of sidelined defencemen to five — Jake Sanderson, Nick Jensen and Dennis Gilbert remain injured, too. To make matters worse, Chabot and Thomson would be out “for a while. ” Advertisement The Senators needed help from their farm club in Belleville, seeking two defenders who could soak up minutes in a pinch ahead of their matchup against the Detroit Red Wings — the team’s biggest game of the year to date. A win over Detroit, coupled with a New York Islanders loss to the Chicago Blackhawks, would have Ottawa back in a playoff spot for the first time since December. Belleville Senators GM Matt Turek heeded those concerns, picked up the phone, and called Yakemchuk. “He seemed very excited, ” Turek told The Athletic. “He seemed like he was up for the challenge. ” Less than 24 hours after taking Turek’s call, and a 5 1/2-hour drive to Detroit later, Yakemchuk rose to the occasion in his NHL debut. The youngster was paired with fellow call-up Jorian Donovan, with both playing limited minutes. There wasn’t even a morning skate for Yakemchuk to get his feet wet. He had to wait until pregame warmup for that. But when the game began, Yakemchuk made the most of his 12: 46 of ice time, gaining power-play opportunities and capitalizing on them. Yakemchuk made a crafty, between-the-legs assist on a Brady Tkachuk power-play goal for his first NHL point. In the second period, Yakemchuk snapped a shot past Red Wings goalie John Gibson for his first NHL goal. “I felt pretty good, ” Yakemchuk said after the Senators’ 3-2 win over the Red Wings. “The guys were great. They’re all super supportive and helpful. They helped me and (Donovan) throughout the game. It was awesome to be a part of it. ” “We got a big game out of (Yakemchuk), ” Senators coach Travis Green said. “Thought (assistant coach Nolan Baumgartner) did a real good job managing their minutes, getting them out at the right times. (Yakemchuk is) a special player. You can see that. We needed a play out of someone tonight. And he gave us that play. ” Advertisement Yakemchuk’s offensive gifts, his puck movement, his shot and his skating have had Senators fans salivating for his arrival for some time now. But he needed to improve his defending, and his time in the American League would help with that while also providing necessary professional experience under his belt. He’d work closely with then-assistant coach Andrew Campbell on his defensive work, Stefan Legein with power-play duties and director of player development Sam Gagner. As Turek remembers, the defender took his start in the minors in stride. By his second AHL game, Yakemchuk had already scored a goal. “It was almost like a game plan, ” Turek said in November. “Here’s a challenge, here’s the game plan for you to improve your game and be in a situation where you’re going to improve.  I think he was fully on board when he got to Belleville. ” The Sens put Yakemchuk in top-pairing minutes while working him into all situations at five-on-five and special teams, in addition to the final minutes of games when the Sens had an extra attacker on the ice. Yakemchuk experienced some growing pains, which explained his paltry plus/minus (currently at minus-30 in the AHL). What also doesn’t help is Yakemchuk is on an AHL team destined to miss the playoffs. It even changed coaches partway through the season, when David Bell was let go and succeeded by Campbell. And in mid-December, Yakemchuk missed over a month because of an injury. But in his first game back with Belleville in January, played at the Canadian Tire Centre in Ottawa, Yakemchuk wasted no time returning to form and flashing the skills that made him such an enticing prospect. Safe to say Carter Yakemchuk is back. Peep the assist on this goal. pic. twitter. com/g4b6z79D2W — Julian Mc Kenzie (@jkamckenzie) January 18, 2026 “It looked like he’s been playing for the last five weeks, ” Campbell said in January, the night Yakemchuk made his return. Advertisement Yakemchuk has 10 goals and 36 points in 50 games in his rookie AHL season, good for second-most points among rookie rearguards. Earlier this month, he had a 4-point game, which earned him AHL Player of the Week honours. And as his offence continues to impress, the Senators say he’s improved defensively as well. The key for Yakemchuk will be to continue gaining strength so he can impose himself against bigger, stronger players at the NHL level. “He can think the game at the pro level, ” Campbell added. “Offensively, he’s always been able to play the game at the pro level. And early in the year, I was working on the defensive side. But he’s done a great job making strides there. He puts in all the work. It was a focus on it with him early in the year. But he’s been getting better and better, and right before he got hurt, he was playing some great hockey both ways. ” In early January, Ottawa Senators general manager Steve Staios even acknowledged that if it wasn’t for Yakemchuk’s getting hurt, there might have been a chance he’d have played NHL games already. And after the trade deadline earlier this month, Staios said they’d look at all possibilities with their defence corps in the offseason. But there was a possibility of their promoting players internally to fix whatever remaining holes they had. Though not a guarantee, the Sens surely have Yakemchuk in their minds as a replacement candidate. One game, especially one in which he played limited minutes when the Senators were missing a handful of regulars, won’t solely make his case for more NHL playing time next year. But Yakemchuk showed poise, made few mistakes and flashed his offence when his team needed it against Detroit. The expectation from here on out should be to make the most of his on-ice time as long as players like Sanderson remain out of the lineup. The Sens know what they have in Yakemchuk. And they like what they see, especially at such a crucial point in their season. “He sees the ice well, ” Green said. “He passes the puck well. He can zip it up to our forwards quick. The type of game that we want to play. He’s dangerous at the point. He’s got a shot that he’s capable of getting it through. He can buy some time while he’s dragging it, much like his goal (against Detroit). ” “The first step is always the hardest. But he did a good job tonight. ” Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle Julian Mc Kenzie is an NHL staff writer and contributor to the NHL's news and enterprise team for The Athletic. Mc Kenzie also hosts The Chris Johnston Show with The Athletic's Chris Johnston. Mc Kenzie is also the writer of the upcoming book, Black Aces, on Black hockey players and people. Mc Kenzie's work can also be found in The New York Times, Five Thirty Eight, the Montreal Gazette, the Canadian Press, TSN 690, CTV Montreal and more. Follow Julian on Twitter @jkamckenzie