Trevor Lewis knocked out after brutal collision with Rasmus Asplund.

The National Hockey League's schedule of games kicked off early on Saturday and barely a minute had gone by before things got pretty crazy.

It was the Buffalo Sabres and the Los Angeles Kings facing off for the NHL's early game and although things were fairly routine for the first 60 seconds of the game, when we headed into minute number 2 of the contest things took a drastic turn for the worst. In what appears to have been a fluke accident both Los Angeles Kings forward Trevor Lewis and Buffalo Sabres forward Rasmus Asplund collided along the boards and it seems safe to say that, based on their initial responses to the collision, Lewis got by far the worst of it. 

The 2 centers were both attempting to make a play on the puck which was loose along the boards at the time, and both men appeared to attempt to do so by extending their arms and reaching for the puck. The play from both men was fine, but when combined together it resulted in a collision that saw both men go head to head with a decent amount of speed behind them no less. Lewis immediately collapsed to the ice following the impact while Asplund, somehow, appears to have escaped from this one unscathed.

Lewis looked as if he had been knocked out by the blow and although he did initially show some movement when he tried to get back up to his feet, he immediately collapsed back down to the ice where he would remain for several long moments. Even once he rose to his feet it was easy to see that Lewis was still seeing stars and was struggling to maintain his balance, so much so in fact that he needed a pair of teammates to help carry him back to the bench and into the locker room.

This was not a dirty play of any kind but instead merely appears to have been a poorly timed accident on the part of both men, one that unfortunately resulted in what looks like it may be a significant injury to one of the parties involved. Hopefully Lewis will make a full and speedy recovery here. 

Here's the angle that best shows the head to head colission: