You don’t REALLY know that your friend didn’t accept Jesus at his death;s door.....that’s why we are not allowed to judge who went to heaven and who didn’t (EXCEPT someone who lays down his life for someone, and that is especially true of women who die in childbirth...imho...they a STRAIGHT TICKET TO HEAVEN).
That is just how I believe. I do believe we have to accept Christ as our Savior - everybody’s invited - and I believe that people who do not know him while alive will meet him face to face at death and he will probably be pretty hard to reject. Purely thoughts out of my own head. I don’t profess to know.