stave off

Related to stave off: touch base, drop off

stave off

To defend against or keep someone or something at bay; to delay something. A noun or pronoun can be used between "stave" and "off." He's been trying to scrounge up money so that he can stave off his creditors for a while longer. An old trick is to suck on a pebble to stave your thirst off.
See also: off, stave
Farlex Dictionary of Idioms.

stave someone or something off

to hold someone or something off; to defend against the attack of someone or something. (See also stave something off.) The citizen was not able to stave the mugger off. The army staved off the attackers for three hours without letup.
See also: off, stave

stave something off

to delay or postpone something unwanted, such as hunger, foreclosure, death, etc. (See also stave someone or something off.) He could stave his thirst off no longer. Despite the enemy sentries, he made a dash for the stream. The lost hiker could not stave off her hunger any longer.
See also: off, stave
McGraw-Hill Dictionary of American Idioms and Phrasal Verbs.

stave off

Keep or hold away, repel, as in The Federal Reserve Board is determined to stave off inflation. This metaphoric expression transfers beating something off with a staff or stave to nonphysical repulsion. [c. 1600]
See also: off, stave
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Idioms by Christine Ammer.

stave off

v.
To keep or hold someone or something off; repel someone or something: I staved the attackers off with my umbrella. Health officials are trying to stave off an outbreak of disease.
See also: off, stave
The American Heritage® Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs.
See also:
  • add in
  • a crack at (someone or something)
  • (someone or something) promises well
  • all right
  • a/the feel of (something)
  • (I) wouldn't (do something) if I were you
  • a slew of (something)
  • (have) got something going (with someone)
  • a straw will show which way the wind blows
  • (you've) got to get up pretty early in the morning to (do something)
References in periodicals archive
It should do so with a view to making its economy more competitive to stave off the Chinese challenge as well as to raising its dismally low savings and investment rates.
Cry for Latin America: those narrow sovereign debt spreads and booming stock markets have been a mirage
"If we had had 500 small-sized buildings in Astoria, for example, cutting back on electricity just a bit during the crisis, the data shows we would have provided the power to stave off the failures that left them and their neighbors in the stifling darkness, for days," he said.
Power company asks regulators to re-write the rules
One observation shared by commentators is the overall financial health of the industry going into the storm season and the large amounts of capital that flowed into the industry afterward, both of which tend to stave off a hard market.
Weathering the after-waves
Guided injections have been shown to alleviate the pain within hours of treatment, stave off pain for several days, and generally postpone and in many cases eliminate the need for surgery altogether.
New treatment for painful heel bumps
It took determination to stave off cramps and dead legs, but I give much of the credit to running with a down-to-earth guy like Governor Huckabee.
A run-walk inspired
The implementation of such measures, they write, could stave off a fate such as that of Nineveh, whose ruins sit today beneath the sands of the Iraqi city of Mosul.
One minute to midnight
The Changing Tides finds that only the little band of heroes that include Solar (a mystral warrior sword to serve and protect Braksis), Thamar (a dwarven hero), and Adonis (the leader of ISIA) who have survived in the aftermath of all these disasters are all that the Seven Kingdoms have to stave off total disaster --and they each of incredible obstacles they must overcome.
The Changing Tides
--Ray Pohlman, a spokesman for AutoZone, an auto-supply store, on the nationwide increase in demand for Locking fuel caps to stave off gas siphoners.
Noted & quoted
The financial pressures of battling aggressive government officials and opportunistic class action lawyers, all while trying to stave off a better-funded competitor, soon became too much for the still-young company to bear.
Who killed PayPal? "Consumer advocates" can make life miserable for consumers
Or are the alarm bells likely to bring some kind of changes that will stave off such a calamity?
Pensions: is United deal the tip of the iceberg?
"That's a very important part of communication," Collins added, because it helps stave off resident fear.
Five thing to do right now! To improve communication
Newfoundland argued it had to defer the pay adjustments, originally agreed to in 1988, to stave off a money crisis that threatened the province's credit rating.
Newfoundland court allows financial crisis to delay pay equity
The sustainable development of eco-lodges like Posada Amazonas are not a cure-all that can stop the destruction of the rainforest and stave off the extinction of native human cultures.
Peru's wild life: touring the Amazon basin
Fujita argues that there are major and growing threats to the health of our coastal and ocean waters and that society must take steps now to stave off potentially catastrophic impacts in the marine environment.
Heal the Ocean: Solutions for Saving Our Seas
The tribe, the Coushatta, has been running a huge gambling casino in Louisiana near Lake Charles and wants to stave off competition from another tribe eager lot some gaming action of its own.
Ralp Reed attracts Indian casino cash, hypocrisy charges