TORONTO

Battles of life and death occasionally play out on a hockey rink.

That was the case in one Etobicoke arena when a hockey player in his 60s collapsed on the ice and stopped breathing Monday night.

Two rink employees immediately sprang into action and ended up bringing him back to life.

Dany Revelle, 27, and Bartley Blair, 36, were on duty at Canlan Ice Sports on Martin Grove Rd. when someone alerted them to a player who had hit the ground and wasn’t breathing.

Grabbing an automatic external defibrillator (AED) from the hallway, the two sprinted towards the rink.

“When we got to him, he was purple,” Revelle recalled Thursday. “He was dead.”

Blair began chest compressions as Revelle started defibrillation. The first shock “pretty much lifted him straight off the ground” as the player gasped for air.

“Right from a movie, arms shaking and everything,” Revelle said.

As the man’s vital signs returned, paramedics and firefighters arrived and transported him to hospital.

That’s when the two men realized they had just saved someone’s life.

Blair and Revelle said their “phenomenal” training in CPR and using an AED enabled them to work as a team.

“We didn’t really have time to think about it, we just reacted,” Blair said. “We just did what you’re told to do.”

The incident prompted Revelle to buy two AEDs himself: One for his home and one for his parents.

At $1,100 a piece, he said they’re worth it.

Canlan spokesman Kevin Ball, 51, said the man, who suffered a heart attack, wants to remain anonymous.

Ball spoke with his family Wednesday night and confirmed the man is “doing well” and that family members “just want to thank these guys for saving his life.”

“His wife said no hockey for a while but I’ve said to her maybe some light skating when he’s feeling up to it,” Ball joked.