Science Hill High School

Gary "Shorty" Adams

Gary "Shorty" Adams 1989

Whether you were trying to get him down or get him out, Gary "Shorty" Adams was a tall task.

Adams rushed for 2,004 yards and scored 27 touchdowns while leading Science Hill to a 9-2 record and a share of the Big Ten title in 1988. He had a league-record 342 yards on 26 carries against Volunteer and rushed 41 times for 221 yards in a 21-13 defeat of Dobyns-Bennett.

He then hit 19 home runs while helping Science Hill to a 31-7 record in

baseball, and was drafted by the Montreal Expos. It was the era of

two-sport stars like Bo Jackson and Deion Sanders, but Adams nearly didn’t play football his senior year. He said he missed the first two weeks of practice because he was playing in the Dizzy Dean World Series for Pappy Crowe.

It didn’t seem to matter. Adams averaged 8.8 yards per carry as a senior.

He didn’t play in the fourth quarter against Volunteer after breaking the

320-yard record of Tennessee High’s Rocky Clay while scoring on runs of 27, 50 and 54 yards.

Hilltoppers teammate Bart Lyon remembers a chorus Adams inspired: "We used to chant on the back of the bus: Shorty to the left, Shorty to the right.

Give him the ball, we gonna win tonight."

Before becoming a starter in the secondary, Lyon got to mop up some at quarterback. But it was hard to get reps if Adams was still in the game.

"As soon as the coaches sent the play in and I called '48 Sweep'" Lyon

said, "I knew we wouldn't be on the field long because Shorty was getting ready to take it to the house."

Adams’ success refuted the notion that modern athletes needed to concentrate on one sport.

"Shorty Adams had to be one of the best they ever had in both," former Elizabethton coach Dave Rider once said while discussing the topic.

Adams’ favorite memory was rushing for 221 yards while beating D-B, the 'Toppers' first in the series in four years

"We hit Shorty some real shots," D-B coach Ted Wilson told the Press-Chronicle after the game. "He's strong."

Adams cherished each of the 41 carries Coach Bob May fed him.

“It meant a lot having a coach who trusted you enough to give you the ball 41 times against a good team like D-B,” Adams said.

May has been part of the Science Hill program or had a front-row seat for more than 50 years.

"Gary Adams was one of the best running backs, if not the best, I've ever seen at Science Hill," May said.

Adams was runner-up for Tennessee Mr. Football in '88 and Georgia's Vince Dooley was recruiting him before he was replaced by Ray Goff. Adams got a better offer from Montreal, and got to play baseball in Canada, Idaho, Sumter, S.C., and two stops in Florida during his four-year stint in the minors.