Alexei Valeryevich Yashin (Russian: Алексей Валерьевич Яшин; born 5 November 1973) is a Russian former professional ice hockey centre who played 12 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Ottawa Senators and New York Islanders, serving as captain of both teams. He also played nine seasons in the Russian Superleague (RSL) and Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) for Dynamo Moscow, CSKA Moscow, Lokomotiv Yaroslavl, and SKA Saint Petersburg. He was inducted into the IIHF Hall of Fame in 2020. He was named the most valuable player of the RSL in 2008 and has won two gold medals, one silver, and two bronze medals in international play.
Yashin began his professional career playing for Avtomobilist Sverdlovsk in the Soviet Union in the 1990–91 season before joining Dynamo Moscow of the Soviet Championship League for the 1991–92 season on a three-year contract. In 28 games with Dynamo, he scored seven goals and three assists for ten points. He was heralded as one of the top European prospects ahead of the National Hockey League (NHL)'s entry draft, ranked second among skaters by the NHL's Central Scouting Bureau. He returned to Dynamo for the 1992–93 season, recording ten goals and 22 points in 27 games.
Going into the 1992 NHL entry draft, the consensus was that the Tampa Bay Lightning, with the first overall selection, would select another player and that Roman Hamrlík would be available when the Ottawa Senators selected second. However, the Lightning selected Hamrlík, and the Senators turned to Yashin as their backup plan. Still under contract in Russia, it was only at the beginning of April 1993 did the Senators seek to get Yashin signed and travelled to Europe to negotiate with him. They reached a tentative agreement that month. However, in order to facilitate the signing, Ottawa was rumoured to have paid a $500,000 release fee to Dynamo Moscow in order to acquire the player. The deal was reportedly for five years and $2.2 million. Yashin arrived in Ottawa for the 1993–94 season, along with Ottawa's other highly touted first overall draft selection, Alexandre Daigle. He made his debut in the Senators season opener on 16 October, a 5–5 tie with the Quebec Nordiques and recorded his first NHL point, assisting on Bob Kudelski's second period goal. He marked his first NHL goal in his third game, a 5–4 loss to the Florida Panthers on 14 October. On 3 November, he recorded five points in a game, including his first hat trick, in a 7–5 victory over the Edmonton Oilers. The next night, he recorded four assists in a 7–6 overtime win over the Winnipeg Jets. Yashin soon eclipsed Daigle as the team's brightest young star and after Ottawa's representative to the NHL All-Star Game was traded to Florida, Yashin was selected as his replacement. He was the only rookie at the All-Star Game, but stood out, scoring two goals including the game winner for the Eastern Conference. On 24 February he recorded three assists in a 6–4 victory over the San Jose Sharks. He had another three-point night on 23 March, marking one goal (the game winner) and two assists in a 5–4 comeback win over the Detroit Red Wings. In April, he had a four-point night on 6 April with one goal and three assists in a 6–5 win over the Washington Capitals and the next night, a three-point game with one goal and three assists in a 5–4 loss to the Boston Bruins. In 83 games with Ottawa, he scored 30 goals and 79 points, finishing second in rookie scoring. During the season, he scored or assisted on almost a third of all of Ottawa's goals, earning him a nomination for the Calder Memorial Trophy. However, Yashin was not among the three finalists for the award, and his omission caused some shock among the Senators organization, as he had widely been tapped to be one of them. He finished fourth in voting.
Off the ice, Yashin's time in Ottawa was tumultuous. Senators' management initially viewed Daigle, who had been selected first overall in the 1993 NHL entry draft, as the franchise's cornerstone player. While they hesitated in offering Yashin a five-year, $4 million contract, they signed Daigle to one of the largest rookie contracts in history and touted him over Yashin for the Calder Memorial Trophy at the conclusion of the 1993–94 season. Yashin began making demands to re-negotiate his contract in June 1994, threatening to hold out, later demanding a trade. However, before he could complete his threat, the NHL locked out the players in a labour action, causing a delay to the start of the 1994–95 season. The lockout lasted until January 1995. Yashin became the first NHL player to swap leagues during the lockout, signing with the Las Vegas Thunder of the International Hockey League (IHL) in October. Yashin was criticized by the National Hockey League Players' Association (NHLPA) representative Steve Chiasson, claiming that signing in the IHL took away jobs from other hockey players. This was exemplified by Ottawa's newest first round draft pick from the 1994 NHL entry draft, Radek Bonk, who was also in a contract stalemate with the team, and was contracted to Las Vegas. Bonk, who had starred with Las Vegas the prior season, saw his ice time decline as he was replaced by Yashin on the power play and his production plummeted, with many Ottawa fans now seeing Bonk as a bust. After Yashin and Kevin Dineen signed with IHL teams during the lockout, the IHL commissioner, Bob Ufer, prevented any further signings of NHL players within the league. While with Las Vegas, Yashin underwent surgery for a hernia, missing three weeks. In 24 games with the Thunder, Yashin scored 15 goals and 35 points. Once the lockout ended in January 1995, Yashin was informed he was no longer eligible to play in the IHL. He continued to hold out and was suspended by Ottawa without pay until he returned to the team. He finally agreed to return to the Senators on 21 January after arriving at an agreement concerning bonuses with management. He recorded his first three-point game of the season on 2 February, tallying one goal and two assists in a 6–4 loss to the Boston Bruins. The game after he had been benched for indifferent play by his coach, Rick Bowness, Yashin recorded a hat trick in a 5–5 tie with the Washington Capitals on 23 February. After Daigle was moved to join Yashin's line alongside Rob Gaudreau, the three began scoring at a heightened pace, with Yashin adding three assists in a 11–4 thumping by the Quebec Nordiques on 26 March. The line registered eight points in the game and scored 75 percent of the team's goals, but their defensive capabilities were limited, as they were on the ice for three of the New Jersey Devils' goals in a 4–2 loss on 29 March. He finished the season with 21 goals and 44 points in 47 games.
The contract dispute between Ottawa and Yashin began again in June 1995, when Yashin demanded a trade after the team refused to renegotiate his deal and what he considered the team's poor response after his father was injured in a car accident. Senators' owner Rod Bryden refused to give in to his demands and threatened to send Yashin to the Thunder Bay Senators of the Colonial Hockey League. Rumours of a possible move to the New York Islanders also began that offseason. A trade was nearly completed with the Detroit Red Wings where Yashin would have been exchanged for star centre Steve Yzerman. The Senators' director of player personnel John Ferguson made public remarks in support of keeping Yashin in August which were criticized by the team's general manager Randy Sexton, leading to Ferguson's departure a week later. He refused to honour his contract at the onset of the 1995–96 season, unless the terms were renegotiated to make him the team's highest-paid player. Some commentators sympathized with Yashin's position in the initial disputes, as Daigle had struggled to live up to his billing while Yashin's offensive numbers exceeded Daigle's in every season they played together. Yashin returned to Russia in October, where he joined CSKA Moscow ("Central Red Army") and played two games in contravention of international agreements. CSKA Moscow, the Ice Hockey Federation of Russia, and the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) then had a nine-hour meeting that resulted in a public declaration that Yashin and CSKA Moscow had broken the agreements and that Yashin was ineligible to play with them, on threat of international sanctions. After appearing in a further two games CSKA Moscow bowed to international pressure after threats of expulsion from the Russian leagues and international bans for all of their players and Yashin was removed from the roster. In the four games in Russia, he scored two goals and four points.