Player Paralyzed in High School Football Game, Whose Injury Inspired 'Friday Night Lights,' Dies at 20

SAN ANTONIO – David Edwards, who was paralyzed during a 2003 high school football playoff game and whose injury was fictionalized in the TV show "Friday Night Lights," died Wednesday. He was 20.

Edwards, who had been stricken with pneumonia since late last year, stopped breathing Monday night and slipped into a coma, his grandfather said.

Edwards would have turned 21 on Saturday.

Edwards, a junior defensive back at San Antonio Madison, had the fourth vertabra of his neck snapped when he collided with an Austin Westlake wide receiver when both were reaching for a pass during a November 2003 playoff game.

Director and producer Peter Berg was attending the game. In the pilot episode of Berg's TV show "Friday Night Lights," a high school football player breaks his neck and is paralyzed while trying to make a tackle.