ST. LOUIS — The St. Louis Blues have hired Mike Babcock’s son, Michael, as a skills coach.
Babcock and former defenseman Mike Weber are joining Craig Berube’s staff, general manager Doug Armstrong announced Wednesday. Berube oversaw the search for replacements for Craig MacTavish and Mike Van Ryn, assistants who were fired after St. Louis missed the playoffs.
Babcock, 28, finished this past NHL season with the Ottawa Senators, helping the coaching staff with developing game plans, pre-scouting and on-ice skill development. Before that, he spent two years working for his father as an assistant for the men’s hockey team at the University of Saskatchewan.
His father has been linked to the head-coaching job for the Columbus Blue Jackets, who may have to wait until June 30 to hire him. Mike Babcock, despite being out of the league since being fired by Toronto in 2019, is under contract with the Maple Leafs until the end of the month, with six figures still due to him.
Michael had been garnering interest around the NHL as a young assistant.
Weber, 35, who joins Berube’s staff as an assistant coach, spent the past three seasons in that role with the American Hockey League’s Rochester Americans. He played 360 NHL games from 2007 to ’16, after which he attended Blues training camp on a tryout before playing in the AHL and then Europe.