Upon returning to Boston with the Blues, Jim Montgomery looks back on his time as coach of the Bruins
So, when the Bruins fired Montgomery on Nov. 19, 2024, following an 8-9-3 start, his initial thought was to shield his children.
“Well, you have to go into that kind of mode in a great sports town like Boston,” Montgomery said Thursday, a few hours before his new team, the Blues, took on the Bruins at TD Garden. “Boston, Philly, New York. I think right away you’ve got to go protect your family. When I got the call, it was a little bit right around 2 o’clock, and the first thing I did was I drove to my kids’ school. It’s a hard time. It just is. And it’s not the fault of anyone. It’s the life we choose.”
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Upon his return to the Garden, Montgomery said he was filled with “a lot of great memories,” including the 2022-23 season, when Boston set an NHL record with 65 wins and he won the Jack Adams Coach of the Year Award.
He also acknowledged the bitter end to that season — a first-round playoff loss to the Panthers — and to his coaching tenure in Boston.
Montgomery was snapped up by the Blues just five days after his dismissal, but he is still unsure if that softened the blow of getting fired.
“I don’t know. I mean, it happened so quickly. I was still in the mode of ‘Where did I go wrong? What did I do wrong?’ And then all of a sudden, the phone rings and you got to start [preparing],” said Montgomery, who was 120-41-23 behind the Bruins’ bench. “It helps you get over it quicker, but I still felt like it would’ve been healthy to have more time. That’s just the way my brain works.”
Montgomery turned around a floundering Blues squad that caught fire late, earned a playoff spot, and then took the top-seeded Jets to seven games in the first round. He took time after the Blues’ playoff run to reflect on his time in Boston, and answer those questions.
“Of course I did. You always do,” said Montgomery, who returned to Boston for May and June as his kids finished the school year. “I think if you’re going to grow as a person, you have to realize whether it’s your personal life or your professional life, what exactly you could have done better. That’s what I look at. I don’t look at what others could have done better because I don’t control others.”
Montgomery’s firing was the precursor to the mass exodus that took place during trade deadline week, when Brad Marchand, Brandon Carlo, Charlie Coyle, Trent Frederic, and Justin Brazeau were dealt. Those deals didn’t give him any sense of validation.
“I don’t think any time teams fail it’s just one person. It’s impossible. Everybody had a hand in the success of the great year that we had the one season, [and] everybody had a hand in why we failed last year,” Montgomery said. “And I would say the same thing 1764893911 because in St. Louis last year everybody had a hand in why we took off like we did, and this year why we struggled, the same thing, everybody had a hand in it.”
Montgomery believes his experience in Boston has helped him navigate St. Louis’s rocky start this season. Using his notable sense of humor, he explained why.
“There was no question that I was better prepared to handle the lack of success than I was last year. And expectations drive a lot of that,” he said. “Last year, the expectations were that we were going to be a playoff team. Didn’t work. So, everybody has these high expectations. Kind of like going to a movie. I remember going to see ‘The Usual Suspects.’ No one told me it was a great movie. I left there floored. I had to go watch it three more times to figure out who Keyser Soze was. But then I’ve gone to movies where people are like, ‘This movie is the best movie ever,’ and I leave halfway through. ‘Pulp Fiction,’ I left halfway through, because so many people said it was so great. It’s like 10 mini stories in one movie. It’s not the way my brain works. But that’s what happens with sports teams, as well.”
Jim Montgomery’s Blues have struggled this season.David Zalubowski/Associated Press
Montgomery said he and his family “loved every part” of their time in Boston — for the record, he dined at Bricco in the North End Wednesday — and he doesn’t sound like a man who harbors any ill will toward the Bruins or its leadership team of president Cam Neely and general manager Don Sweeney.
Montgomery noted that because of the roster turnover, there aren’t a lot of players left that he has deep connections with.
“But the people I do have a long history with, the equipment managers, the athletic trainers, the people that work in the Garden, the people that work in the office, Sweens, Neely, there’s a lot of great memories with all those people,” he said.
Jim McBride can be reached at james.mcbride@globe.com. Follow him @globejimmcbride.
