More than $15,000 raised for local teacher hurt in car crash

Chris Hope put out the call to his NFL buddies and football greats back in Rock Hill.

Come to my hometown for a basketball game, he asked. The response Saturday was beyond anything Hope imagined.

A sellout crowd of more than 2,000 packed the gym at Rock Hill High School to watch a celebrity game featuring many of the best athletes ever to come out of York and Chester counties.

The event raised more than $15,000 for Phyllis Paden-Adams, a longtime Rock Hill-area teacher who suffered major injuries in a car wreck.

Paden-Adams - known by everyone as "Mrs. P.A." - wore a San Francisco 49ers cap and T-shirt in honor of her son Phillip Adams, who just signed with the team.

"I'm just speechless," Paden-Adams said from her wheelchair, surrounded by family members. "I've gotten more kisses than a pig at a kissing contest. It's been wonderful."

Hope, the Bearcats legend now with the NFL's Tennessee Titans, played on a team with Rock Hill natives Jonathan Hefney, Tori Gurley and Stephon Gilmore. They were joined by Hope's ex-teammates with the Pittsburgh Steelers, cornerbacks Bryant McFadden, DeShea Townsend and Ike Taylor.

"It's a great opportunity for these guys to get back," said coach Gerald Dixon, another former Bearcats star. "They meet up this time of year. A lot of people don't know, they played all the sports when they were younger. It's just a natural thing for them."

Rock Hill native Jeff Burris, who starred at Notre Dame, said he is always amazed at the pipeline of NFL talent coming out of Rock Hill. Burris coached a team that included Ben Watson, Derek Ross and Jamie Robinson as well as former Winston-Salem State quarterback Tony Woodbury and Fred Bennett of the Houston Texans.

"As an older guy, seeing all the talent we have here, it's incredible," said Burris, 37, now a high school coach and part-time sports radio broadcaster in Indiana.

Hope said he keeps in touch with the NFL guys from Rock Hill through text messages and off-season visits.

"It's a fraternity," he said. "Jeff Burris and Gerald Dixon, those guys were trailblazers. They kind of knocked on the door."

The night brought back memories for Keith Hunt, coach of the basketball team at Rock Hill High from 1991 to 1998. A half-dozen future college stars played on Hunt's teams.

"I can't remember the last time I saw all of them together at one time," said Hunt, now a special needs teacher at a school in Monroe, N.C. "It's great to see how successful they've been - and are."

This story was originally published May 24, 2010 at 12:00 AM with the headline "More than $15,000 raised for local teacher hurt in car crash."