Minor league hockey player’s leg clipped by skate, game in Peoria called due to bloody scene

PEORIA, Ill. – A bloody in-game injury led to the suspension of a Southern Professional Hockey League game on Saturday night.

Huntsville Havoc centre Justin Cseter (SEET’-er) and Peoria Rivermen player Dennis Sicard were chasing after a loose puck during the second period Saturday when Sicard’s skate clipped Cseter’s right thigh. Cseter suffered a large, deep gash, which bled heavily.

Cseter managed to skate about 30 or 40 feet after the accident before going down on the ice in pain, said Rivermen media relations director Greg Halbleib. Medical personnel and trainers from both teams rushed onto the ice to respond.

“He was trying to get off the ice but there was just too much blood,” Halbleib said. “He just couldn’t continue.”

Halbleib said Rivermen general manager Bart Rogers told him Cseter was released from a Peoria-area hospital about 1 a.m. Sunday.

Rogers told Halbleib the 26-year-old Havoc’s prognosis is good, and that the Huntsville team would take him back home.

The SPHL is to decide the status of the game. It was stopped with 13:37 left in the second period with Peoria leading 2-1.