St. Louis Blues star Vladimir Tarasenko is leaving the bubble of the Western Conference postseason in Edmonton to seek further medical evaluation on his injured shoulder, the team announced Tuesday.
Tarasenko will return to St. Petersburg. Louis to meet with team doctors for further evaluation of his left shoulder, which was surgically repaired in October 2019. He missed 61 games for regular seasons for the Blues, but returned to training camp in July for the fresh start of the NHL season . The team says an update on Tarasenko’s status will be available next Monday.
“It’s concerning. Again, we do not know much yet. I will not jump to conclusions about anything,” Blues coach Craig Berube said.
Tarasenko missed one game in the team’s round robin tournament and was considered “unfit to play” in Games 3 and 4 of her quarterfinal series against the Vancouver Canucks – the Blues’ only two wins of the postseason. In four games, Tarasenko was a nonfactor, going scoreless with a minus-1 and just 10 shots on goal.
He had 11 goals and six assists in 26 games during the Blues’ Stanley Cup championship last season.
“He was apparently not comfortable with the way it felt, so we have to look into it,” Berube said. “We are a team. We sometimes play without players because you have to. Our team is what makes us a good team. We trust each other. Different people can come in and do the work.”
St. Louis and Vancouver are tied in their quarterfinal series. Game 5 is scheduled for Wednesday.
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