During his tenure as head coach of the Boston Bruins, Jim Montgomery was never one to shy away from criticizing his players through the media. In fact, the last two Bruins coaches, Bruce Cassidy and Montgomery, never held back when it came to ripping their team through pregame and postgame press conferences.
Toward the end of his tenure as Bruins coach before he was fired last November, Montgomery never shied away from his comments. He threw Jeremy Swayman under the bus in his final Boston press conference. Montgomery was hired a week after being fired by Don Sweeney by the St. Louis Blues, and he was able to turn them around and get them to the playoffs.
Former Bruins coach Jim Montgomery snapped after Blues loss to Capitals
Year 2 is off to a tough start for St. Louis and Montgomery, and after a 6-1 loss to the Washington Capitals on Wednesday night, Montgomery hit a breaking point on his 2025-26 Blues.
"Well, this is unacceptable tonight. It's that simple," Montgomery said. "We have to dig in, and starting tomorrow morning when we wake up, have a good skate and get ready to play the Sabres. And show up for our fans, our city, and our owners."
This came after Alex Ovechkin notched career goal No. 900 in the Washington win. Over the final two periods, St. Louis allowed five goals, and four of them were in the second period.
"We got the puck 10 feet before the red line in the first five seconds of the game, and we (Oskar Sundqvist) iced it," said Montgomery. "We weren't ready to play. We weren't ready to start on time. And we got worse after the first period."
Rants like that will sound familiar to Boston Bruins fans. It happened a lot, and Blues fans will find that out. It's too early to say Montgomery's job might be in trouble, but they are 4-8-2 through their first 14 games.