Fogarty lone senior to depart Vikings

COLFAX — She may have been the only senior on this year’s basketball team for the Colfax Vikings, but she was a mighty important one to be sure. Dempsey Fogarty was a four year varsity player and made herself known as one of the best defenders in the conference as well as the whole area and proved it by holding every team’s leading scorer below their average in just about every game the past few years.

Fogarty was a part of three conference championship teams, as a freshman, sophomore and junior years and in her four seasons as a Viking, her teams had a combined record of 83-18 and 55-5 in conference play. All five of those conference losses came this season while the team was undefeated in the conference the three previous seasons. She was a freshman reserve on the team that played in the WIAA state tournament and no doubt learned her leadership qualities from some of those girls as she helped her younger teammates deal with plenty of ups and downs this season.

Fogarty saw action in five games her freshman year and played more as a sophomore.

She really came around her junior season however, scoring 130 points with 10 triples and 14 of 37 free throws. She was second on the team in rebounds with 114, first in steals and second in assists.

Her senior year she led the team in just about every category including rebounds with 204, blocked shots with 25, assists with 94, and 101 steals. She was second in scoring with 199 points but had the best shooting percentage from the floor with 49%. She was 38 for 87 from the foul line for 43% and made nine treys.

Her career totals were 349 points, 346 rebounds, 178 steals and 160 assists. Her high scoring game was 21 points against DeLaSalle this year, and she had a high of 14 rebounds in a game against conference champion Elk Mound and had eight steals against St. Croix Central.

Fogarty could frustrate every opponent she defended by sticking to them like glue and somehow coming away with a steal from anywhere on the court, or pulling down a rebound in between several taller players. In her final game against Eau Claire Regis in the regional championship, Fogarty held Shea Brey, a Division 1 recruit for Butler, to just five points.

Fogarty was named All Conference Second team as a junior and finished off her career as an All Conference First team selection this year.

Coach Joe Doucette commented after every game on Fogarty’s abilities, both mental and physical.

“Dempsey continued to amaze me with her heart and effort,” he said. “She took a bunch of young kids with no varsity experience and helped make them a pretty good team by the end of the season. She led by example and always had a high motor running. She filled the stat sheet up on many occasions and showed the younger kids how good we could be by playing hard the whole 36 minutes of a game on both offense and defense. We can’t replace someone with her talent and drive,” he added.