Jim O'Neill knows athletes. As the longtime hockey and baseball coach at Cretin-Derham Hall he has coached some great ones. Joe Mauer to name one. Wisconsin defensman Ryan McDonagh to name two.
Mark Alt could turn out to be another. He led the Raiders to a Class 5A football title playing quarterback but is expected to sign soon with the Gophers in hockey.
"That's still the plan," O'Neill said. "He's got a ways to go. but he has got a pretty future. He is high end."
The Central Scouting Bureau rates Alt the 37th best draft-age player in North America. He is among 100 players from America, Canada, Europe and Russia invited to the NHL Combine in Toronto next month. The draft is in late June.
"Mark had not played a lot [of hockey], but he has a lot of ability," O'Neill said. "He is a big kid, a great skater. Mark, he needs experience."
But both Alt and the Gophers want him to play college hockety this coming season. "They both on the same page there," O'Neill said.
"He has played a lot of football when other kids were playing hockey," O'Neill said. "I don't think he has ever play hockey more than five months a year. But he has done a lot of that select [hockey] stuff with elite players and done well. Last summer he went to a lot of football camps, too, and the summer before that he was hurt."
What obvious advantage Alt has is his size. "He is a big kid," O'Neill said, and growing.
