North High head football Coach Charles Adams III releases a balloon in memory of Deshaun Hill. Photo by David Pierini

By David Pierini, Editor

Through a winter’s worth of snow, the mourners trudged to the 50-yard line of Hobbs Field.

The line dozens of people long carried bright balloons, held each other up, and prepared Sunday to reflect on the life of 15-year-old Deshaun Hill.

They formed a tight circle around the family of “D-Hill”as a man with a baritone voice urged everyone to “get closer and love on these people.”

It was one of several weekend tributes to the North High sophomore who was fatally shot while walking from school last week. On Saturday, there was a moment of silence at a Polar home basketball game, where players wore warm-up shirts with his nickname and number.

On Sunday, family, friends and teammates released the balloons on the field where Hill took over the starting quarterback job as a 15-year-old and quietly led the Polars to a 9-1 record last fall.

“The burden that we bear today there’s so many things we don’t understand,” North principal Mauri Friestleben said during a brief ceremony. “I’m not going to lie, I’m angry. My anger and my heaviness are clouding my perspective. It’s making it difficult for me to think about God’s purpose in this moment.”

The Hill family invited the community to worship service at the North High auditorium Sunday. Photo by David Pierini

“I don’t know what to say to the kids because everything we ever taught them, D-Hill was that. We tell them to go to school and get good grades, we tell them to be good. D-Hill did.”

After a prayer offered by Bishop Richard Howell, of Shiloh Temple International Ministries, Friestleben asked the crowd to raise their balloons high and release them on the count of nine, the number Deshaun wore for the Polars.

On nine, the sky quickly filled with blue and white balloons and Mylar stars. A few were shaped in the number nine With eyes gazing upward, there were cheers, briefly, and then silence and sobbing.

Hill’s number nine will be retired “but it’s always going to be in our hearts,” Adams said. Photo by David Pierini

Afterward, Polar head football coach Charles Adams III announced Hill’s number would be retired. “That was his number and it’s going to stay with him,” he said.

Adams also said that next season, the Polars will take the field short one player for one play each game.

“D-Hill was our starting quarterback, so every game we’re going to go out there with 10 people and take a delay of game or whatever the penalty, “ Adam said. “Next season is for him. We’re going to retire his jersey. We’re going to have number nine on our helmets, but it’s always going to be in our hearts.”

Before leaving for a worship service for Hill in the high school auditorium, there was a call to lay hands on the family and on Adams.

As they prayed, Adams told his players, “I got you.”

On the field where he shined, Polar community grieves loss of ‘D-Hill’