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Since savoring Peterson's stardom, Allison has been tied to talents like MLB All-Star pitcher Braxton Ashcraft, who caught 37 touchdowns one season at Robinson High School under Allison, and like Traylon Shead, who rushed for 10,298 yards and set a Texas state record with 141 career scores at Cayuga HS led by Allison. Although, "nothing compares to what happened with Adrian and that show," Allison assured.

"I wish I knew then as a football coach what I know now. We probably would have been a lot better," Allison confessed. "But it didn't matter. At the end of the day, it was hand No. 28 the ball and let him take care of it. Because here's the deal: You could hand him the ball, and if there was no hole and the linebacker stepped up, he was going to run his butt over. That's just a fact. Or, if he wanted, he would stick his foot in the ground; he would run directly sideways to the sideline because he was faster than everybody else, and God forbid he got 1-on-1 with the corner. That kid wanted none of Adrian Peterson."

The ripped teenager taught Allison. Specifically, not to get too cute in his gig as offensive coordinator.

In the initial game of Peterson's senior prance — Allison's debut guiding Palestine's offense — the first drive started off swimmingly. Peterson accelerated around the right side for 20 yards. Then Peterson dashed left for 20. And after that, the nation's No. 1 overall recruit, probably smirking, burst inside for 20 more.

"So, it's first-and-goal from the 8 and I'm this young play caller. I'm like, 'OK, yeah, you've got to do something different.' I remember we faked it to Adrian, and we dropped back and we got sacked. And the next play, I remember we called a sprint out … and we got sacked," Allison recalled. "And [then] I remember the head coach (Harrell) walking to me. He goes, 'Tommy, let me tell you something. You see 28 right there?' And I said, 'Yes, sir.' And he said, 'If you don't give him the ball, you just called your last play.' So we handed it to Adrian — it's third-and-goal from the 18 — and he cruises in for a touchdown.

"And there you go," he said. "The rest of the year is history."

'This is going to get crazy'

​

Twice, Eudey was struck by an epiphany that Peterson was different.

The first occasion was happenstance. Peterson was playing for a separate youth team, but Eudey's son was asked to be part of it when they traveled to a football showcase in Texarkana. Peterson dominated.

In a series of games, opponents "ran him out of bounds and hemmed him up," Eudey said, "but I don't think they ever tackled him the whole day. And I remember on the way home, one of the boys riding with me said, 'I'm going to remember this trip because we went and ate coconut shrimp,' or we did this.

"I said, 'All of you guys are going to remember today because you played with Adrian Peterson.' "

The second instance was on the precipice of "the recruiting wars." Peterson, who lived with Eudey in the eighth grade to help cope with family tragedies — losing his brother, Brian, to a drunk driving accident, and his father Nelson's incarceration — was a junior now, and college interest was about to runneth over.

On this day, one of the main recruiting agencies shared information that made Eudey bullish about the future. The person's name on the other line escapes Eudey in the present — Harrell used to say to "Call Steve" when he was inundated by coaches and bloggers — but the feeling that rushed over him doesn't.

"He called me and he said, 'Mr. Eudey, you do realize that I'm fixing to make Adrian the No. 1 recruit on my list.' I said, 'You mean, in Texas?' and he said, 'No sir, I'm making him the No. 1 recruit in the nation.' "

Eudey reacted accordingly: " 'Oh my god,' " he thought to himself. " 'This is going to get crazy.' "

"You know how normal people have wallpaper on the wall? Well, his wallpaper was college letters and college envelopes and brochures of every school wanting him," Peterson's friend David Cummings said.

Cummings is a year older than Peterson, and they go way back as neighbors, and AAU teammates on a squad coached by Nelson and as opponents in youth league football. Also, Cummings was quarterback at Palestine when Peterson transferred from the crosstown school and joined the varsity his junior season.

"His sophomore year, we had a coach here that came in (to Palestine) and he only coached one year — and he wasn't a believer. That's all I can say. He wasn't a believer," Cummings shared. "Funny story, the next year he went to a school we had on the schedule, and I want to say Adrian hit him for 396 [yards]."

Peterson was arrowing to elite status as a freshman not 10 miles down the street at Westwood High School but ended up busting his knee. Eudey recalled disagreements between young A.D. and the coaches there about adequate rest. They wanted Peterson to rehab for the following season. Peterson desired "to play basketball and run and [do] all that stuff that a boy does at that age," Eudey said. So, A.D. switched schools and played JV football due to circumstances, including the doubt Cummings outlined.

That spring, Harrell met Peterson when he was the head track coach, before he was hired to lead the football team. (He watched Peterson shave a second off his time in the 100 meters by his senior year.)

He was sold right away on Peterson's prospects as a football player and started him at tailback in 2002.

Harrell said, "After about two games, Texas A&M sent a full scholarship in the mail. He was just amazing."

"You could tell he was destined to be great from the minute he touched the field," added Cummings, whose recollection of Peterson being "The One" dates to that Texarkana tournament where he estimates Peterson averaged four touchdowns over six games. "Everything he did was amazing. Every time he touched the ball, man, he was a threat to score, kind of like it was in the NFL. Nothing ever changed."

Cummings attested: "One thing I can say about Adrian is everything that he went through made him stronger. He used life experiences for his fuel, and that's what made him great. That's just what made him the greatest. Everything that he went through, he used pain as fuel."

'That kind of athlete'

In 1978, Tom Lemming laid eyes on Eric Dickerson in Sealy, Texas. After that, he saw Herschel Walker in Wrightsville, Georgia, Bo Jackson in Bessemer, Alabama, and Marcus Dupree in Philadelphia, Mississippi.

"What it was back then was big guys who can really run," said Lemming, a titan in recruiting analysis for almost half a century. "Now you don't see that. You haven't seen anybody in years, since, really, Adrian."

There's one from Yulee, Florida, Lemming made note of Derrick Henry, but he was sought as an "athlete" instead of specifically as a running back.

From his rolodex of reports, the players that Lemming likes to lump together are Dickerson, Walker, Jackson, Dupree and Peterson. He met the last of the magical five at a Luby's in College Station. Lemming selected Peterson to play in the U.S. Army All-American Bowl and tabbed him as the country's top player.

"Usually, our No. 1 kid could be a little cocky," he said. "But Adrian wasn't. He was quiet, nice and polite.

"He carried it very well," Lemming stated of the Nation's Best mantle. "And a lot of the guys don't because they're 18-year-old kids that are being treated not only by fans and coaches but their parents, most of the time, treat them like they're the head of the family and they're the star. Adrian didn't act like that. I was surprised when I met him at Luby's, how quiet he was, and very sincere and very nice."

Peterson of course was anything but between the whistle and lines. He cut viciously and ran angrily.

"I know he worked hard at it, but he was born with a great running back body — great speed, vision, balance and moves. He had everything," Lemming said. "We haven't seen his like in the past 25 years."

Cummings stated, "the bloodline was destined to be Hall of Fame worthy," pointing to the superb genetics Peterson gained from his dad, an All-Big Sky guard on the Idaho State basketball team in the mid-80s, and his mom, Bonita Jackson, a state champion sprinter who ran at the University of Houston.

"I played college ball at a small school in Oklahoma, and I came home on a bye weekend, and man, I've never seen so many people at a high school football game watching him," said Cummings. "It was just a whole new atmosphere. He turned Palestine into somewhere that people liked to be — just to see him."

While Peterson transformed his humble hometown into a destination that college recruiters zipped to at the phenom's pace, the state, top to bottom, including future rivals and teammates, sat on the edge of its seat. Brian Robison, who started his football story two hours away in Splendora and starred at Texas before the Vikings drafted him 102^nd overall in 2007, heard murmurs of a kid in Palestine ready-made for the big stage. Word of mouth — there was no social media filled with video highlights — made skeptics, at first, then believers.

"In a lot of ways, it was kind of like the LeBron James effect in football. He was doing so many crazy things that it just sounded fake," said Robison, who spent a decade in the Vikings locker room with Peterson.

Totals from those days are sometimes incongruent because stats were handheld and compiled individually. The Texas High School Football Hall of Fame credited Peterson with 5,011 yards and 54 rushing touchdowns over his junior and senior seasons. In the latter, A.D. was just shy of averaging 12 yards a pop.

"His stats are amazing, but they could have been twice as high had I played him all the time," said Harrell, who couldn't fathom the possibility of Peterson getting hurt when Palestine got ahead. "So, you know, it's just one of those deals I couldn't live with, a kid that talented. I didn't let him return kicks. I didn't let him return punts. I think Adrian could have played in the NFL at linebacker. He could have done anything. He could have played baseball, tennis — whatever he wanted to do. He's that kind of athlete."

In some games, Palestine's staff had to hide Peterson's helmet so he couldn't reenter the fray.

"Boy, that used to kill him," sighed Harrell, who recently retired after 30 seasons in Texas and five in Arkansas.

Allison said Peterson had to take off his shoulder pads, "otherwise he'd find a way to carry the ball more." Additionally, there were practice periods where Peterson was removed from drills so the team could improve. He was too quick, too difficult to tackle, too good to be denied if things were awry.

"He always made it right," Allison said proudly.

Everybody within his gravity — foes, friends, teammates, coaches, strangers — became privileged observers. They reveled over A.D.'s ability to outrun, outmuscle and outmaneuver entire defenses.

"The players were 'ahhing' and 'oohing' about him in practice because everyone heard about him, but they hadn't seen him," Lemming recalled Peterson stealing the spotlight in San Antonio versus a bounty of college-bound All-Stars. "His team, the West team, practiced, and they were going crazy [over what he was doing]. Then the East players told me later … They said, 'Geez, this guy's like an NFL player already.' "

Also a talent to behold on the track, Peterson sprinted 100 meters in 10.33 seconds when he was 18 years old. For context, Justin Gatlin won back-to-back NCAA championships in the 100 meters, clocking 10.08 and 10.22, before turbo-ing the 100 in sub-10 seconds to clinch gold at the 2004 Athens Olympics.

"The first time I met him, I realized he was real fast — faster than everybody," said former Oklahoma Sooners defensive back, and A.D.'s buddy, Marcus Walker, who then paused and laughed nostalgically.

Currently an assistant coach at Syracuse and a Waco, Texas native, Walker initially met Peterson on the track circuit and then clicked throughout prolific recruiting processes. They tightened their bond during the U.S. Army All-American Bowl. Twenty-three years later, his memory of Peterson at that event is indelible.

One practice into the all-star experience, Walker said he phoned home and raved to his family and friends. "I was like, 'Yo, listen. This dude is better than Derrick,' " he said, his smile on the other end of the line apparent as he paralleled Peterson's splendor to Waco High School and Texas Longhorns (and four-time Pro Bowl) sensation Derrick Johnson. "I remember him running past me at practice and I felt that wind — I was like, 'Gollee!' Like, 'Damn, OK, he is something else – different than everybody else."

Peterson and Walker were roommates at OU and reciprocated attitudes about outworking one another — and anyone else, of course. They were iron sharpening iron, and A.D.'s mental soundtrack was prophetic in the end.

"He always talked about being the best — being the best ever," explained Walker, who tells his players nowadays, "You just don't become Adrian Peterson out of nowhere."

'A hero we could touch'

Peterson's only gear was fast.

"I can remember going down and watching one of his high school games his senior year, and he literally, when they were on offense, if you got up to go use the bathroom and come back, there's a good chance you just missed a 60-yard run or an 80-yard run," said former Oklahoma running backs coach Cale Gundy.

Many colleges spent 18 months, give or take, trying every which way to swoon Peterson. The Sooners efforts were in a class of their own, though. Gundy, with assistant coach Darrell Wyatt and Head Coach Bob Stoops, used their one "in-home visit" going to the Federal Correctional Institute in Texarkana where Nelson Peterson was serving a sentence that limited his presence — but not his impact — in Adrian's life.

"If you look at all the great parents, all the different people who produced or created a prodigy, I think there's a similar feature in all those people, and that's just pushing those young men and women to the limit, and I think that he always did," Carlos Wilson, one of Adrian's youth coaches, mentioned of Nelson.

"He demanded excellence and he pushed him, and he didn't let off on him. And so even when he was not there, physically, the respect factor was still at a high, high level," Wilson added. "He was very, I would say, strict and very hard on him because I think he saw what nobody else saw. Like, Adrian has a chance to be special, and he wasn't going to allow him not to be special due to work ethic or character or things like that. And so, you know, he stayed on him a lot. A lot of times I would want to say, 'Man, c'mon, cut him some slack,' but hell, I'm scared of him, he's my mentor, so hell, I don't want to step in."

Adrian's talent on the football field amazed Wilson when he played for him in the 5^th and 6^th grade, but the former D-I basketball coach has known him since he was born because he grew up under Nelson's wing on the hardwood. Wilson said he realized Adrian was different when Nelson brought him to the Lincoln Gym and he hung on bars — not monkeying around like on the playground — and did chin-ups.

Oklahoma was aware of the father-and-son bond, and Nelson valued the school's efforts to meet with him.

"I've never been to the pen before. I don't know what I'm getting into. I have no idea. I mean, we've had no communication with the dad — wasn't able to. But there was a Sunday, the first day we could go out (under NCAA rules), and we had the first visit lined up," Gundy recalled of the unique recruiting pitch.

"We sat down outside. It was an open area. There were no fences or anything, and out comes Nelson," Gundy added, transmitting the anticipation. "Even if you saw Nelson Peterson today, you would think, 'Damn, did that dude play in the NFL?' I mean, he's physically just a good-looking, sharp, well-built guy. And we sat there for about, I don't know, an hour, and visited with him, and had the best conversation."

The face-to-face with Nelson taught Gundy "why A.D. was the way he was," he said.

From vice-grip handshakes to mannerisms, to politeness, Gundy saw a spitting image of Adrian in Nelson, particularly as it pertained to his treatment of people and physical exceptionalism. Ultimately, the trip to Texarkana persuaded Gundy that A.D. was influenced by his father to rise under pressure.

"I just think one of the things about him that was different is he took things so seriously," Wilson expressed. "Every rep, whether it's practice, whether it's a sprint, whether it's a scrimmage, whether it's a game that you're up by 30 or 40, every rep that he had, he took it like his life was depending on it."

The discipline and desire to work — and outwork — matched him to the Crimson and Cream, Gundy believed. Lo and behold, Nelson Peterson retained a "special love" for Oklahoma that dated to his near decision to play basketball for Billy Tubbs after attending junior college, but he never swayed his son.

All he asked was for Stoops to give Adrian "a fair chance."

"The only thing promised to him was an opportunity, and I think that's what finally clinched the deal with him," said Gundy, alluding to Nelson's request. "He didn't need anybody to give him everything."

Of all the physical attributes that decisively separated Peterson from his peers, none surpassed his intangibles. That's what coaches and teammates, decades after his high school dominance, preached.

The positive effects have a degree of permanence.

"He allowed us to be able to say from a town of 20,000 or how many of them we have, he gave us a sense of pride that we were the best in something. You know, it's kind of like if one of us makes it, it's like all of us made it," Wilson said. "And so we were able to turn the TV on and be able to say, 'Hey, we're the best. The best that has ever done it came from this same neighborhood. It came from this same town.'

"It's not like we're in Dallas or New York or Houston or something like that. Like, you saw him every day. He comes home, you see him. If you call him, he's going to answer. We had a hero that we could actually touch," Wilson continued. "When you say Palestine, Texas, the first thing that I mention, if you don't know where Palestine, Texas is, 'Do you know Adrian Peterson, the running back?' "

The answer, always, is yes, and people connect that Palestine is the quaint city Peterson put on the map.

And is the place full of faces he has never forgotten.

"He got elected into the Texas Sports Hall of Fame, and I remember going to that, and I hadn't seen him in 15 or 16 years," Allison shared. "He's up there doing his speech, and he sees me and he sees a couple of other coaches over there and calls us out by name. It's like, 'Wow,' you know, those are the things — as good as he was, that's what I remember. And I remember him coming after and giving me a big hug."

Akin to his abilities to outrun, outmuscle and outmaneuver, Peterson had a knack for impressing people with his graciousness and dogged determination, and upbeat disposition even against extreme difficulty.

"The way he was with classmates, with everybody, the way he carried himself, just the little smile on his face that he always [had]," Allison reflected on Peterson's impact. "Even when he played, this little smile, this little gotcha. And I don't remember any moment where he flipped out or was mad. I just remember … 'I got this'; that bit of confidence that he carried with this little smirk on his face that I'll never forget."

Gundy recognized the qualities A.D. possessed and said he wished the lengths Peterson went to achieve his dreams were cataloged in some capacity, so current players could reach theirs more easily.

"He was gifted, but his drive and his passion, which was instilled in him by his mom and dad, is just, it's like no other," Gundy noted matter of factly. "I'd give anything if you could bottle all that up, or if you had that old VHS tape and somebody filmed him for three years or even in little league and junior high and high school when his dad was around him, and how he raised him and how he pushed him and challenged him and how he accessed all that, and never backing down from anything, and to show that.

"I think it would blow people away the type of person that A.D. was," Gundy added.

'Something we'll never forget'

The first half of Peterson's high school finale showed his rare strain, rarer strength and rarest speed.

On his second carry versus Hallsville in the Class 4A bi-district playoff game Nov. 14, 2003, Peterson stepped twice to his right then transferred his weight and crossed his quarterback's face to accept a counter handoff going left. He was greeted at the line of scrimmage by a pair of defenders, and then a third as he reversed direction, and a fourth as he built depth and width galloping around the right side. Peterson outflanked the fifth and lowered his pads to level the sixth a few feet inside of the numbers.

He netted half a yard and Palestine punted, but good heavens it was epic.

"People have asked me questions about it before — what'd we do to stop him? Well, it's not that we stopped him," former Hallsville Head Coach Roger Adams said. "Through all my research, I believe he ended up with 241 yards that night, and he scored three times. But I guess we contained him enough."

Palestine's second possession began mere inches from its goal line and Peterson on one play trucked a defender to avoid being tackled in the end zone. His fifth rush of the evening and first of the third drive after Hallsville jumped in front 7-0 picked up a handful, about as much as his first four carries combined.

And A.D.'s sixth, well, it went the distance — 52 yards — on a QB option pitch on third down. The play itself didn't catch Hallsville by surprise because it knew Peterson was a candidate to get loose any time, but his can't-touch-me speed and can't-hold-onto-me-if-you-do strength outdid their high expectations.

"It's a whole different time back then," said Roger's son Kyle, a kicker/punter and receiver on that Hallsville team. "We didn't have social media. So, you're reading newspaper clippings, you're watching the news on TV. We knew he was good. I'm not sure that we really had a concept of how good he was."

Peterson toted it eight times on the offense's next turn and plunged in from short range for six. Then, Palestine recovered a pooch kick, and Peterson re-strapped his work boots after a 12-yard loss on a sack. His 15^th rush, with nearly 10,000 fans holding their breath at Trinity Mother Frances Rose Stadium, was a shotgun handoff into the jaws of Hallsville's defense. Like second nature, Peterson spun out of one tackler and accelerated away from another before he was dragged down 25 yards later. His 16^th carry came immediately and was a snapshot of a battering ram falling forward onto a heap of defenders for 5 yards. A.D. got a break on the next play as the quarterback ran one — to set up his final prep touchdown.

"This dude looked like he was a Greek god out there," Kyle Adams said earnestly. "I've not — even coaching now for 18 years — I've not seen a high school kid anything like what Adrian Peterson was."

"He still defines Palestine," Kyle added. "Ironically, our regional track meet is hosted in Palestine, and so I get to go back to Palestine every year, and every year they have this Adrian Peterson jersey on their press box. It shows you how much he has left a legacy on a program, a city, a school district and a community."

​

At the 7, from the I-formation, foreshadowing some of his future successes, Peterson rushed off-tackle left. Six players swarmed him like a furious beehive, so Peterson, outside the hashes now, planted his foot, flipped his head, erased tackling angles on the backside and ran, impossibly, to the opposite pylon.

A.D. captured it plus a two-score lead in the process, and he cemented his status as an East Texas legend.

"God, he was phenomenal," Roger Adams accentuated.

Adams is in his 45^th season as a coach and has faced countless talents. He touts 1992 first-round draft pick quarterback Tommy Maddox, who played at L.D. Bell HS in Dallas-Fort Worth, as one of the finest.

But "as far as a pure athlete, being physical and fast, no doubt that Mr. Peterson was the best," he said.

Roddrick Muckelroy, who inspired Hallsville as it scored 13 unanswered in the second half and dashed Peterson's and Palestine's dreams, agreed, in a sea of Texas talent, "Adrian was just on a different level."

"I always laugh [telling] people. I'm like, 'I think Adrian went for about 100, maybe 150 to almost 199 yards that first half,' but we were able to calm down," Muckelroy said of the comeback. "There were several plays where me and him, we were just battling. It was one of them things that's just a dog fight from the beginning to the end. And if you gave him an inch, he would take a mile. So it was like, man, you cannot take any play for granted, or next thing, you're looking up at 28 running down the sideline."

Muckelroy didn't know Peterson personally, yet. He only knew what A.D. looked like shredding opponents because he got home in time to watch Friday night lights clips on a local channel. He started paying attention to Peterson when, well, "They gave him the full highlights for their news segments."

"Leading up to that game, it was crazy," Muckelroy recalled with energy as if it was yesterday. "My dad, he let me know [the stakes] every day. Like, 'Hey, Adrian Peterson.' Every day of the week. He was waking up [and saying], 'Adrian Peterson.' I couldn't wait to get to that game and kind of see how it all unfolded.

"I respected everybody, especially coming out of East Texas. There's a different type of brotherhood," Muckelroy added. "But at the same time, you want to go test your abilities to see where you stand. And for me that was big because if I'm gonna play the No. 1 running back in the nation and I think I'm a top linebacker, this is going to be on everyone's radar. So leading up to that game it was a different mindset."

Roughly four times smaller than Palestine, the win for Hallsville — over Peterson — had a real David vs. Goliath vibe and is an enormous source of pride for Muckelroy, who led the Longhorns in tackles in 2008 and 2009 before being drafted by Cincinnati in 2010 (later on, he trained with Peterson in the offseason).

"I ended up with 20-some tackles that game," Muckelroy said without gloating. "You heard all the noise all week long: 'No. 1 running back.' You have people at your own school like, 'Man, y'all gon' get beat by the No. 1 running back.' So to go [play like] we did, everybody was excited. It was a big thing for the city."

One grade younger than A.D., Muck' noted they met face-to-face a few years later at a joint-birthday party for Peterson and his college teammate Clint Ingram, a Hallsville grad. "He's like, 'I know you from somewhere, I can't put my [finger] on it,'" Muck recalled. "And we just got to chopping it up, like, 'Bro, I'm from Hallsville — Muckelroy,' and after that we've just kind of been tight; we've been cool ever since."

The loss came at a cost around town but didn't diminish one bit the euphoria Peterson gave to Palestine.

"I remember being at church [a few weeks later] and somebody said something about it and my mom came to me — my own mother, you know, who came to every one of the games," Allison remembered. "And she's like, 'Son, you're telling me you had the National Player of the Year and y'all got beat in the first round? What is wrong with you?' It was just crazy. Just fun, man. Something that we'll never forget."