His return could provide a boost for the Blues (11-8-2), who had lost four of five games and scored eight goals in that stretch before the win Saturday.
"Any time you can get a world-class player back in your lineup, we get excited," defenseman Robert Bortuzzo said. "He's a big part of our team, he has been for a long, long time here. World-class skill and talent and ability to put the puck in the net. It's an excited group to have him back."
Berube said Tarasenko needs to be comfortable with contact before he can return to the lineup. Tarasenko did not speak to the media Friday.
"I try to talk to him all the time when I see him," Berube said. "I don't always ask him about that situation, but that contact stuff is really important because you can skate all you want and your conditioning will be good, but it's really the battling, the contact and all that stuff that really wears on you when you've been out this long. Also, it's for his shoulder too, but the conditioning side of things, that's hard to do in practice. When you're in a game, it's totally different, so it'll be important we do a lot of that stuff with him before he plays."
The Blues are also without injured forwards Jaden Schwartz (lower body), Tyler Bozak (upper body), Ivan Barbashev (ankle) and Robert Thomas (thumb); and defensemen Colton Parayko (undisclosed) and Carl Gunnarsson (knee). Forward Jacob de la Rose left the win at San Jose on Saturday in the first period with a lower-body injury, but there was no update afterward.
"Any time you can get a player like [Tarasenko] back, it's huge for the team," forward Zach Sanford said, "especially with where we're at right now. Getting a player of his caliber back is good for the spirits and hopefully helping us get going here and score some goals."
