Jim Montgomery had one word to describe the whirlwind week he’d experienced. Or make that two.
“Crazy, crazy. There’s no other word for it,” said the new coach of the St. Louis Blues, speaking to the media for the first time on Monday, six days after being fired by the Boston Bruins and one day after being hired by the Blues.
Fired on a Tuesday, hired on a Sunday. Montgomery, 55, admitted that when Blues general manager Doug Armstrong rang him after he’d been fired, he assumed it was just to show support for him, having previously worked with the club as an assistant coach.
Montgomery was fired 20 games into his third season in Boston and a day after a 5-1 loss to Columbus in which the Bruins allowed two short-handed goals. He departed with a 8-9-3 record this season and a 180-84-33 mark as an NHL head coach, which also included one-plus season in Dallas.
“When (Armstrong) called, I thought this was a social call of, ‘Hey, you know, I’ve been there, keep your head up,’ ” Montgomery said.
Instead, the Blues’ GM was offering a job, one that came with a five-year commitment with a team he’d spent two years with as an assistant to then-head coach Craig Berube from 2020 to 2022.
“Doug Armstrong is someone that, obviously, was really important to my second chance,” said Montgomery, referencing his return to hockey after being fired by the Dallas Stars in December 2019 for “unprofessional conduct inconsistent with the core values and beliefs of the Dallas Stars and the National Hockey League,” before later announcing he had entered a rehab program to deal with alcohol abuse.
That time spent in St. Louis was what prompted Armstrong to fire his coach, Drew Bannister, and hire Montgomery when he became available. That familiarity is also what Montgomery feels will give him an advantage with his ‘new’ team.
“I think it gives me a tremendous head start,” Montgomery said.
While reluctant to declare his group — currently 6-12-1 and in sixth place in the Central Division — a playoff team (“I don’t know the ceiling yet, so I can’t answer that definitively”), Montgomery said the term would allow him to take what he declared to be an offensive-minded group in the right direction.
Asked how Armstrong persuaded him to take the job, so shortly after having been let go by the Bruins, Montgomery offered up this gem: “The best line that put his hooks into me was: ‘When something delicious falls on my plate, I eat.’ So I dunno, I guess I was a T-bone that day.”
— With files from The Associated Press
