​Jul. 15—Few people brought as much joy and happiness to those around him as did Noah Boler-Kyle.”Whenever he walked in a room his smile would instantly light it up,” former Decatur Heritage basketball coach and Noah’s adopted father Tommy Kyle said. “He made everyone happy.”AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementThat sentiment seems to be held by everyone who knew him.”He was always bigger than the room,” said Jason Marshall, Noah’s basketball coach at Decatur Heritage. “He was so charismatic, so funny and just treated people so well. People were drawn to him and he was always smiling.”Tragically, that smile was taken away over the weekend when Boler-Kyle died after suffering respiratory arrest due to a severe asthma attack. The former Decatur Daily basketball Player of the Year was 25 years old.”We didn’t expect it when God brought Noah into our lives and we certainly didn’t expect him to be taken from us so soon,” Tommy Kyle said. “You have to trust in God’s plan, though, and we certainly don’t grieve without hope. Noah loved Jesus and we know he’s in a place now that he wouldn’t leave if he had the choice.”AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisementWhen people think of Boler-Kyle, they usually think of the star basketball player that led Decatur Heritage to its first state championship in 2019, was named the ASWA Class 1A Player of the Year and later played in college at Lee University.It took a while to get to that point, however.”I remember it like it was yesterday. He was wanting to come to Decatur Heritage and so he came to an open gym we had,” Marshall said. “This was in middle school and he was already pretty tall but it was clear he had a lot of work to do to be a good basketball player.”Noah’s soon to be adoptive father Tommy had a more honest reaction that he said makes for a funny story looking back.AdvertisementAdvertisementAdvertisement”That open gym was the first time I got to see him play. That night we got in the car and my son Jackson, who was friends with Noah, asked me what I thought. I said that I told him he needed to join the band,” Kyle said. “Music was always his first love; he was so talented and he could play like four different instruments. It’s funny now everyone thinks of him as this amazing basketball player because he was horrible when he started.”As Boler-Kyle’s continued to get taller, eventually reaching 6-foot-9, his basketball skills grew as well. By his senior year he was averaging 15 points and 11 rebounds per game and cementing himself as one of the best basketball players in Decatur Heritage history.”There’s been few players I’ve coached that had the ability to take over a game like he could and it didn’t matter who we were playing,” Marshall said. “He didn’t have that mean streak because he was just too nice, but he played so hard and he would do whatever it took to help the team. You couldn’t ask for a better teammate.”When Boler-Kyle was a middle school student at Decatur Heritage, unfortunate circumstan