An athletic trainer in our area is being hailed a hero.

Army hockey's forward Eric Huss is giving a thumbs up from his hospital bed after he suffered a "severe laceration" in a game against Sacred Heart in Bridgeport Thursday night.

News 12 was told that Huss, a college junior, was accidentally hit in the neck with another player's ice skate who fell after a collision during the second period.

The team's trainer Rachel Leahy immediately began to calmly treat and apply pressure to his wound.

Army hockey head coach Brian Riley is calling Leahy a hero. 

"I was told by the surgeon after surgery last night that he was 10 minutes away from not making it. And so it was Rachel's as well as the other medical folks that were in the building that saved his life," he says. "Thank you, thank you, thank you Rachel. Husser wouldn't be here if it wasn't for her."

Riley tells News 12 Leahy stepped in to help another player last season, too.

Huss is now back at West Point recovering.