excoriate
ek-SKOR-ee-aytverbMeaning to criticize very harshly
Memory hook EX-CORI: criticism that STINGS to the core. The food critic tastes one spoonful of the chef’s soup and tears into it so harshly that the chef shrinks behind his ladle; she excoriates it.
The review excoriated the restaurant for its cold soup and rude service.
In context The coach did not simply point out the players’ mistakes; she excoriated them, listing every missed pass in a voice that carried across the whole field.
Similar blast, slam, denounce, criticize harshly
Opposite praise, commend, laud
From Latin excoriare, “to strip off the hide”: ex- (off) + corium (hide, leather).