Blues add AHL veterans Greg Cronin and Vaclav Prospal to staff

Greg Cronin and Vaclav Prospal arrived in St. Louis with more than open assistant-coach seats to fill. The Blues added two coaches with deep AHL résumés on June 10, pairing Cronin’s structure-heavy, development-first background with Prospal’s offense and power-play track record at Rochester, a clear signal that the organization wants its next NHL call-ups to arrive more ready than raw.

Cronin spent the 2025-26 season as head coach of the Iowa Wild after head coaching stops with the Anaheim Ducks and the Colorado Eagles. His AHL record is 242-165-12-39 over seven seasons, and his Colorado run produced a 164-104-21-9 mark, a .601 points percentage and three Calder Cup Playoff appearances. Iowa’s bio listed 38 years of coaching and player-development experience, a résumé that stretches from Colby College and the United States National Team Development Program to Colorado College, the University of Maine, USA Hockey, the New York Islanders, the Toronto Maple Leafs, the Ducks and the Eagles.

That background matters for a Blues organization that is trying to tighten the line between its NHL bench and its development pipeline. Cronin has spent years teaching habits, structure and details that travel upward, the kind of work that can help young defensemen, checking-line forwards and depth call-ups survive the jump from the AHL to the NHL without losing their identity.

Prospal gives the staff a different kind of developmental lane. Rochester hired him in July 2023, and over three seasons he worked as an assistant coach focused on the offense and power play. The Americans credited him with helping drive a 112-76-28 record, three straight playoff trips and major growth from prospects such as Jiri Kulich, Isak Rosén and Konsta Helenius. Rochester said Helenius scored 63 points in 63 games under that watch, while Kulich and Helenius reached the AHL’s Top Prospects Team in back-to-back years and Rosén and Helenius were each AHL All-Stars.

That kind of track record is exactly why NHL clubs keep leaning on AHL-tested coaches when they build staffs. Prospal, a native of Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic, played 1,108 NHL games over a 20-year career and totaled 765 points, giving St. Louis a coach who has both the offensive vocabulary and the credibility to teach it. The Blues also promoted Elliott Mondou to assistant to the general manager and hired Jeremy Coupal as an assistant coach, completing a broader staff reshuffle under Jim Montgomery, who was named head coach on Nov. 24, 2024.