Leo McCarthy calls them “Mariah’s Messengers.” I call them “heroes.”

Whatever the name, 12 extraordinary young men and women will be honored Monday night as the Mariah Day McCarthy Scholarship is handed out for the 16th time at the Montana Tech Auditorium.

Each recipient will receive a $1,000 scholarship. They deserve $1 million. At least.

Early in the morning on Oct. 28, 2007, Mariah was killed when an underage drunk driver ran over her and a two of her friends as they walked to Mariah’s house. Mariah was only 14.

Mariah would have turned 31 years old in March, so none of the 12 scholarship recipients could have possibly known her. Yet, they still carry on her message. They still help keep her beautiful memory alive.

Mariah’s message is to never drink alcohol while underage and never get into a vehicle with someone who has been drinking.

That might sound like an easy way to go through life. But we know better.

I did not know it at the time, but Oct. 28, 2007 was the day I quit drinking alcohol forever. My desire to drink died the second I was told that the young girl killed was the daughter of my good friend Leo.

I went out for a few drinks after getting off work just before midnight on Saturday, Oct. 27, 2007. I covered the Montana Tech-Montana Western football game that afternoon for The Montana Standard, and I felt I needed a few drinks to wind down from a very long day.

I felt like I needed a few drinks to unwind after work pretty much every night.

Shortly after I left the newsroom, some of my co-workers heard the call over the scanner. Three girls were badly injured in the hit-an-run assault.

Not yet knowing about the tragedy, I laughed with some friends at Maloney’s Bar while my friend’s life was changed forever. Little did I know that mine would change, too.

That Sunday, I watched as the Boston Red Sox completed a World Series sweep of the Colorado Rockies. It should have been one of the best nights of my life.

Instead, I was like a zombie as I watched something I thought was so important before. Instead of focusing on the game, I thought of my friend, and I kept hugging my 4-year-old daughter to the point that I was bugging her.

That Friday, I took my daughter to the Deluxe Sports Bar with me for lunch. As we waited for our steak fingers, Delaney looked at an advertisement for Bud Light in the center of the table.

“Ewe, beer,” she said. “That’s gross.”

“Yeah,” I said. “I don’t want you to ever drink that stuff.”

“I don’t want you to drink it, either,” she said.

“OK,” I said. “It’s a deal.”

That was 16 and a half years ago, and I have not touched a drop since.

While I didn’t recognize it at the time, I needed to stop drinking, too. It turns out that I wasn’t very good at drinking. I had no off switch, and I would do some very stupid things when I drank. One beer was too many and 30 was not enough, and I had a bunch of embarrassing examples of why I should have quit drinking earlier.

At the time, I was a soon-to-be father of two on the fast track toward a divorce. Because I quit drinking, I am a still-married father of three.

My son and youngest daughter have not seen me drink at all, and I am very proud of that fact.

However, I don’t celebrate that much because the timing coincides with the worst day imaginable for my friend, his wife and surviving daughter. Never can I look at Oct. 28 as anything but an awful day.

Whenever someone asks me if I want a beer, I tell them how long it has been since I drank, and they always praise me. It is praise that I do not deserve because quitting drinking turned out to be really easy for me.

That is because I realized that I had every reason in the world to quit drinking. That is because I have had so much positive reinforcement to live up to my end of the deal with my daughter.

My daughter was proud of me, and my wife started to like me again.

No longer would I wake up hungover, wondering if my wife is mad enough to really leave me this time.

With such a strong support group, quitting drinking was no big deal. For me, it was like coasting on a tube down a lazy river.

The 12 heroes who will receive scholarships, however, had to swim upstream. Through white-water rapids.

The world is stacked against our children, almost forcing them into underage drinking.

I saw that first-hand when my daughter was in high school. She was one of “Mariah’s Messengers” in the Class of 2022, and I saw how hard it was for her to live up to those ideals.

After going to Hotel Finlen to take some prom pictures during her senior year, I went for a walk with my dogs. As I got home, I was puzzled to see my daughter’s car parked in front of the house.

I went inside to see her sitting on the couch, in her prom dress, watching television.

“Why aren’t you at the prom,” I asked.

Her answer couldn’t have made me prouder. She came home after dinner because all of her friends were going to a hotel room to drink. So, she came home to wait for the dance to start, then she went to the dance alone.

Drinking is the easy decision for high school students to make. Not drinking is so hard.

That is why I applaud 2024 Mariah’s Challenge Scholarship winners Wyatt Blakeley, Quinn Cox, Bo Demarais, Wyatt Gross, Nathan Heiland, Kenzie Jaksha, Jack Luoma, Selene Morrell, Sullivan Panisko, Karha Rogers, Luke Verlanic and Kadence Frankovich.

Some I have known for years. Others I have never met. Some are star athletes. Others would rather read a book than watch a game.

All are heroes in my book.

Yes, this is the smallest class of Mariah’s Messengers since the scholarship was established. Overall, though, I think we are seeing that Mariah’s Challenge has made a difference. Teenagers today have more pressures and less to do than we did at their age, but they are smarter than us.

Giving into the peer pressure to drink doesn’t mean that they are drinking and driving.

At least I hope that to be true.

As far as the scholarship winners go, I hope they don’t feel discouraged that they are only one of 12. The truth is that the world is full of Mariah’s Messengers, young and old.

While there will not be as many of them on the stage this year, there will still be some young minds watching them. Those minds will pay attention. They will follow the example and someday, too, take their place on the stage. And others will watch them.

There are also some adults who will pay attention and follow their example.

Mariah’s Challenge started from a father’s eulogy of his daughter. Now 16 and a half years later, you cannot put a number the success of the movement. Lives saved by prevention cannot possibly be counted.

But Mariah’s Challenge has saved lives. Yours might be one of them. I know mine is.

That is why I call the 12 Mariah’s Messengers of 2024 — and of the previous 15 classes — heroes.

Those heroes set examples for the future generations, as well as the older ones.

Like with the previous scholarship winners, those 12 will receive a scholarship of $1,000.

They deserve at least $1 million.

— Bill Foley can be reached at foles74@gmail.com. Follow him at twitter.com/Foles74. Listen to him on the ButteCast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.