Vladimir Tarasenko aims to help Wild achieve championship dreams

Five years ago, when he was with St. Louis, Vladimir Tarasenko never figured he would suit up for the Wild — and not because that’d mean he would be switching allegiances in the longstanding Central Division rivalry.

“Every player has not a dream but a goal of playing with the same team all your career,” said Tarasenko, who looked like he could achieve that with the Blues.

But after 10 years, including a Stanley Cup in 2019, Tarasenko didn’t just leave: He bounced around, repping four other teams before landing with his sixth since 2023 after he was traded from Detroit to the Wild on June 30.

“Whatever happened, happened,” Tarasenko said. “I was fortunate to have a chance to win one more Cup [with Florida in 2024], and this team — an organization [that] has very high goals, it’s nice to play for a team that wants to win the Cup. It makes things easier.

“You don’t need to talk twice about your goals and figure out what is the main reason you’re here. I’m here to earn my spot and try to help the team reach the goals.”

Tarasenko’s spot isn’t in question.

As the team’s biggest offseason acquisition, the Wild will give the right winger the chance to recalibrate after a dip in production with the Red Wings, and the perennial scorer is eager to show what he’s capable of accomplishing.

His actions have backed up his words.

In a pair of scrimmages at training camp, Tarasenko scored four goals, including a hat trick, on the second line alongside Joel Eriksson Ek and Liam Ohgren.

“He can really shoot it,” goaltender Filip Gustavsson said. “He comes down, it looks like he’s almost passing or doing something else, and it’s just so fast off the stick.”

During Tarasenko’s first practice, coach John Hynes noticed Tarasenko parked right in front of the whiteboard.

Even on Friday, he was the first to drop to a knee at one chalk talk.

“I’ve been thinking about it all summer and training for a long time, and it’s nice to get it started.”

To come to the Wild, Tarasenko had to green-light the trade from Detroit, which received salary-cap savings in return, and Tarasenko checked in with Kirill Kaprizov, whom Tarasenko has known for “quite a few years.”

Kaprizov said “a lot of good things,” and Tarasenko also felt familiar with players from the times he’d faced off against the Wild, a matchup that saw Tarasenko bury a hat trick in a Game 5 victory for St. Louis during the first round of the 2022 playoffs.

“Whatever [Kaprizov] told me before, it doesn’t look different when I came here,” said Tarasenko, who is under contract for one season at $4.75 million. “It’s everything like what he said.”

The 33-year-old also showed up for camp already having had face time with Hynes.

“It was fantastic,” Hynes said. “It was a lot of food, but it was good, and I got leftovers.”

(Hynes even returned the Tupperware — clean, no less. “We didn’t ask for that,” Tarasenko said with a smile.)

Tarasenko appreciated Hynes flying to Florida, where Hynes got to know Tarasenko, what makes him tick and what he needs to be successful.

“I’ll always ask for a coach to be honest,” Tarasenko said. “If I do well, I don’t need to hear about it every day. If I don’t do well, I’d rather hear about it. I don’t care if it’s in a meeting or somewhere. I can accept if I made mistakes.”

But Tarasenko is trying to help more than the Wild offense.

“When I came over, I don’t have Russian guys on my team, so it was hard,” Tarasenko recalled. “But at the same time, I have guys who took care of me, and they showed me around. And also, it forced me to learn English faster, which is a good thing. You have to be able to communicate, and I always kind of miss it, because even if you know English well, you probably rather have somebody in your native language who you can talk about not only hockey but life in general. It’s a new country.

“It’s good we have four Russian guys here, and we’re all willing to help him as much as we can.”

As for how he’s adapting to the Twin Cities, Tarasenko has a place to live but needs to furnish it before his wife, Yana, and his children join him. Their oldest of the three, Mark, is a goalie for the Dallas Stars Elite Hockey Club that is scheduled to play in a tournament in Minnesota next month.

“He’ll spend a couple nights in our house, hopefully,” Tarasenko said.

Minnesota has been good to Tarasenko in the past.

So, the challenge is to be who he’s been, just now for the home team.