save

Save the day find or provide a solution to a difficulty or disaster.

save the tide in former nautical usage, get in and out of port while the tide lasts.

save us from our friends proverbial saying, late 15th century meaning that the earnest help of friends can sometimes be unintentionally damaging; developed in the early 19th century by the British Tory statesman George Canning (1770–1827), ‘Give me the avowed, erect and manly foe; Firm I can meet, perhaps return the blow; But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send, Save me, oh, save me, from the candid friend.’

See also save one's hide at hide2.