Army’s Huss returns after life-threatening injury

FAIRFIELD — Sort of like any athletic team, one came together on Jan. 5 to keep Eric Huss alive. Trainers, doctors, surgeon, patient: everyone in the zone, doing just what needed to be done, one step at a time.

Tuesday night at Martire Family Arena reunited that team. Huss and Army’s men’s hockey team paid their first visit to Sacred Heart since that night in Bridgeport, when Huss suffered a skate cut to the right side of his neck.

He and Army athletic trainer Rachel Leahy got to meet up with the rest of the team that got him here again, Sacred Heart trainer Benjamin St. Martin, trauma surgeon Matthew Carlson, Pioneers team doctor Patrick Kwok.

“I feel very blessed to be in the spot I am, the support system that I have, the professionals that are around me,” Huss said before Tuesday’s 4-1 Army win, a game the Pioneers billed as Athletic Trainer Appreciation Night.

“I couldn’t have told you anything about a trauma surgeon right before the accident, but I needed him. I was very fortunate that Dr. Carlson was there to take the best care of me and save my life.”

Huss had half-joked last month that he wished his scar was more impressive, and Tuesday, he wondered if there were photos of his injury.

“I remember talking to Rachel in the ambulance, like, ‘what, like a small 1inch cut?’” Huss said. “She started measuring it with her fingers. I was like, ‘that’s pretty big.’ So I was just curious.

“I was asking the guys, and they said ‘yeah, it was bad.’”

Carlson, he said, looked different without the surgical mask.

“Just a great young man,” Carlson said. “It was very easy to take care of him. Very calm. He got great care before he arrived with us. A pleasure to take care of, and great to see him now suiting up, back to hockey. It’s amazing, very rewarding.”

Huss returned to the lineup Jan. 27 against Air Force. Tuesday was the junior winger’s fifth game since the injury.

Late in the second period on Jan. 5 — coincidentally the Pioneers’ last home game at Total Mortgage Arena in Bridgeport before opening Martire Family Arena on Jan. 14 — a collision between two players knocked one of their skates into the air, where it knocked Huss’ helmet off and sliced his facial artery.

Leahy controlled the bleeding and hustled Huss off the ice to the ambulance that took him to St. Vincent’s, where Carlson repaired the wound. Huss returned to West Point the next day.

“Even though it was a textbook dire situation, there was a calmness about what everyone was doing,” Kwok said, “so that everyone kind of went step by step.”

That was everything from Leahy immediately holding the injury closed, not letting go until they reached the hospital, to St. Martin — who supervised Leahy when she was a Quinnipiac student as part of a program at the University of Bridgeport — being prepared to treat both teams when the game resumed.

“(I remember) just watching Rachel and Ben immediately take control of the situation,” Kwok said, “how the player was so calm, and everyone around him did their job.”

Huss was wearing a neck guard on Tuesday, even if the protector might not have done a lot on Jan. 5 to prevent this particular injury. He said his mother would not be happy with him if he wasn’t wearing it.

He said he hasn’t been too nervous about returning to play. He’d mentioned last month the mental health resources available at West Point if he needed them.

To see Carlson again, “it’s just crazy emotion, a crazy feeling,” he said. “It’s tough to put it in words, honestly. I couldn’t be more grateful for professionals like (Carlson) coming to work every day to save lives.”