PEORIA -- The Peoria Rivermen were gaining momentum, had just scored to build a 2-1 lead over the Huntsville Havoc on Saturday at Carver Arena.



And then hockey gave way to horror.





Huntsville center Justin Cseter went into the right corner by the Havoc goal, collided with Peoria's Dennis Sicard, and fell onto Sicard's skate as the latter was on all fours, trying to get up.



With his mother, father and grandparents in the grandstand looking on, Cseter -- a Wisconsin native -- skated out of the corner fighting for his life, blood spurting from his thigh and pooling on the Carver Arena ice and players on both teams frantically screaming for doctors, EMT's, begging for help.



Cseter had been inadvertently slashed by Sicard's skate, across an unprotected gap between the bottom of his pants and above his knee pad at 6:27 of the second period.



He made it to the hashmarks in front of his net, sat down hard, then fell onto his back.



The 4,593 in attendance fell silent. Players' calls for help echoed around the arena. A spectator sitting in the first row, on the glass and with a full view of the gore unfolding on the ice, fainted. (UPDATE: team officials late last night said it was believed the fan suffered a seizure while the drama was unfolding on the ice).



Huntsville trainer Jason Lopez rushed onto the ice and pressed on Cseter's leg, applying pressure. Rivermen trainer Michelle Novak turned and yelled to goaltender Eric Levine 'Get towels!"





Levine rushed to the scene, as did players from both sides. Huntsville winger Corey Bellamy kneeled beside Cseter and held his hand, talked to him.



"The medical people were pouring in, and (Bellamy) asked what he could do. They told him, 'Talk to him, keep him talking,' " Levine said. "He told him jokes. He was great."



The doctor needed to creare a tourniquet. He yelled for someone to break a hockey stick in half. They used it to tie down pressure on Cseter's leg in an effort to control the bleeding.



An EMT brought a bag of fluids and tried to start an IV.



"Cseter was pretty calm, really," Levine said. "He was asking a lot of questions, wanted to know what was happening to him, he said 'Let's all be on the same page here guys' and 'What's the (IV) for?' "



Doctors said Cseter suffered a wound about 1 1/2 inches deep and about six inches wide across his inner thigh on his right leg. His muscle was cut, but the skate blade missed his artery. Thirty minutes later he was rolled out on a stretcher to a waiting ambulance and hospitalized, with surgery ahead of him.



"I joked with him, 'You're gonna be feeling pretty good in a little while when they get you ready for surgery,' " Novak said.



Cseter was rolled off the ice by stretcher to a waiting ambulance, hockey stick/tourniquet in place, and thrusting a thumbs-up to the crowd as he exited.



Rivermen head coach Jean-Guy Trudel and Huntsville head coach Glenn Detulleo met in the tunnel underneath the grandstands, and shared a conference call with league president Jim Combs.



Neither team wanted to play on. Combs ruled the game suspended. They will figure out in the days to come when it will be continued.



"You realize what things are important when something like this happens," Detulleo said. "This was a hockey game. We were all pretty shaken up about it. It was horrible."



Rivermen goaltender Kyle Rank had to leave the Peoria locker room while players talked about the scene on the ice. No one knew if the game would be continued, and Rank, already upset, was desperate to keep his focus in the event the game resumed.



"I had a friend, (Winnipeg Jets player) Zach Redmond, who almost died with an on-ice injury," Rivermen winger Shawn Skelly said. "It's not something you see every day. Mentally, you just get flattened by it and you just don't want to keep playing."



Said Trudel: "I've seen wrists slashed. But this is only the second time I've ever seen something this bad with my own eyes. That is a veteran team over there, and those guys love each other and they are close and this is traumatizing for them.



"I don't think it would have been fair to put players in the position of having to go back out there after what happened."



And with that, the Rivermen officially had a game halted before completion for just the second time in their 33-year history.



"I didn't even know what happened," Sicard said in the quiet Rivermen locker room afterward. "He was behind me on that play. Then he started yelling for help. I've played a lot of games against Justin, he's a good person.



"He and his family are in our thoughts and our prayers."



The Rivermen and the Havoc came back onto the ice in the aftermath, raised their sticks to the crowd and thanked them for understanding.



The fans rose and cheered while the players met at center ice, shook hands, hugged, exchanged thoughts.



"They were awesome, our fans," Trudel said. "The night didn't go the way anybody wanted it to. But it ended the way it should have."



RIVER READINGS: The Rivermen goals were from Josh Harris and Shawn Skelly, while Huntsville's goal was from Eric Alexander. ... Huntsville is not scheduled to return to Carver Arena until a three-game series Feb. 6-8. ... The Rivermen lost one-third of their defense unit to injuries after Friday's opener. Captain Cole Ruwe (upper body) and Paul Arnott (lower body) were scratched Saturday. ... Peoria signed veteran defenseman Tyler Amburgey to a 3-game tryout contract before the game. ... SPHL Huntsville owner Keith Jeffries was on hand.



Dave Eminian covers the Rivermen for the Journal Star. Reach him at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Check out his sports blog, Cleve's World, at pjstar.com and follow him on Tout and Twitter @icetimecleve.