Ottawa Senators Reassign Stephen Halliday, Hunter Shepard

The Ottawa Senators announced today that forward Stephen Halliday and goaltender Hunter Shepard have been reassigned to the team’s AHL affiliate, the Belleville Senators.

Over the past two days, NHL clubs have been making various reassignments to get players rostered in the AHL for the Olympic break, since keeping some names on an NHL team set to go several weeks without a game would be less than ideal for some players. These two reassignments fit that mold.

Halliday, 23, has split time between Ottawa and Belleville this season, which is his rookie campaign in the NHL. The 6’4″ center was a 2022 fourth-round pick who was able to instantly translate his scoring success from the NCAA level with Ohio State to the pro level with Belleville. He scored 14 points in 17 combined AHL regular-season and playoff games after signing with the Senators in the spring of 2024, and scored 19 goals and 51 points in his first full year of pro hockey.

So far this season, Halliday has been able to enhance his production level at the AHL level, and has even begun to translate some of that scoring to the NHL. In 22 AHL games, Halliday has scored 26 points. In 25 NHL games, Halliday, who averages just 8:08 time on ice per game, has 11 points. The 1:56 per game he averages on the power play has helped, of course, but his results have been undoubtedly promising for the Senators.

Entering the season, Halliday was ranked as the No. 7 prospect in the Senators’ system by Elite Prospects, who wrote that he “could top out as a top-nine playmaking power forward” if he made improvements to his skating and pace of play.

While it’s too early to tell if Halliday will be able to ultimately fulfill that projection, this year has been a step forward in his development, and he’ll be tasked with sustaining that step forward back at the AHL level over the Olympic break.

As for Shepard, his reassignment is more standard as he’s been mostly an AHL player this season. Shepard has six games of career NHL experience and has played in 36 minutes at the NHL level in 2025-26. Once a star AHL netminder who led the Hershey Bears to back-to-back Calder Cup titles, Shepard’s form in the league has declined over the last two years.

In 2024-25, he posted an .891 save percentage across 39 games in Hershey, and the Washington Capitals pivoted to other goalie options. He signed with the Senators this offseason, but has been unable to get his numbers trending in the right direction. He has an .888 save percentage in just 14 games played for Belleville, and is a pending UFA.