The No. 3 high school basketball player in Alabama died Thursday after collapsing on the court while playing the game he loved.

Pinson Valley High School senior Caleb White, 17, became ill around 1:15 p.m. while training with his teammates, according to his grandfather.

He suddenly dropped to the ground and was rushed to the hospital, but doctors couldn’t revive him, George Varnadoe Jr. said on Facebook.

“At 17, he was dead!!!!” Varnadoe wrote, adding that his grandson was an “honor student, very respectful, high intellect, excellent role model, phenomenal basketball player.”

“Our whole family was really looking forward to his upcoming senior season and afterwards, playing for a D-1 school and then perhaps the NBA. But…..it wasn’t meant to be,” the grieving grandfather added.

“You see, everything that happens, happens on time, because God wouldn’t allow it to happen, if it wasn’t on time. And so it was with Caleb. We all have an appointment with God, one that you can’t reschedule.”

Varnadoe said his grandson suffered cardiac arrest, but the Jefferson County Coroner has yet to determine a ruling, AL.com reported.