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COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO. -- A Colorado Springs family is trying to cope with the sudden loss of their 17-year-old son.

Sam Hesselberg's mother found him on the bathroom floor Friday afternoon. By the time he arrived at the hospital, doctors said Sam's brain was bleeding, and he had suffered significant brain damage.

On Saturday doctors declared Sam brain dead, and his family made the difficult decision to turn off life support.

Sam was a senior at Palmer high school, a talented athlete, and healthy, which is why his sudden death has shocked so many and left a lot of unanswered questions.

"They're still not sure if it was an aneurism, or a blood vessel, or a concussion," Leanne Hesselberg, Sam's mother, said.

His parents said the three-sport letterman showed no signs of being sick but did tell a friend Friday that he had a bad headache.

"I found him and he was having convulsions," Leanne said. "And so I called 911, and Steve came home while the ambulance was here, and they took him to Memorial Hospital, and they already knew that he had brain damage, and they saw a lot of blood in the brain, rather than outside the brain, so they said it was very grim right away. And they did a CAT scan, and there just wasn't anything they could do."

Now friends and family are holding on to the memories of a young man who they said was everybody's friend.

"Sam was everybody's little brother," Sam's father, Steve Hesselberg, said. "We called him the neighborhood kid because everybody knew Sam."

Hundreds gathered outside the Hesselberg's home Saturday night for a candlelight vigil, leaving behind memories they shared with Sam.

"As we read the letters, the big hole in our hearts started to close up a little bit, and we were just amazed at how many kids felt he was their friend, a good friend, a best friend," Steve said.

Sam is remembered as a 'good kid,' and his parents said he was just born that way.

"He was so easy and good, from the first day," Leanne said. "He was just a joy and brought us so much happiness. He never talked back, he never rebelled about anything, he was just a really sweet, good boy."

Sam's parents said Sam will live on. He was an organ donor, and a little girl in Utah received his 'big' heart.

"We're hoping some day we can hear his heart, beating in someone," Leanne said.

His father agreed.

"That would be my greatest wish, to hear Sam's heart," Steve said.

The family has asked doctors to perform an autopsy on Sam's brain to help determine what caused his sudden death.

A funeral will be held for Sam Wednesday afternoon at Palmer High School.