When it came time for Dani Kanas to scout colleges to attend, participating in track and field at the next level wasn't a consideration for her. Honestly, she wasn't very aware of colleges that had adaptive sports programs, much less a university close to her home in Lutz, Florida, just north of Tampa.

Once she realized that a few colleges did offer her an opportunity to continue competing in the shot put and javelin, she expanded her search criteria. That meant including schools such as San Diego State and Michigan. But San Diego is a long way from Tampa, and Michigan's winters get a bit chilly.

Then she heard of another big school that was set to begin an adaptive sports program: Alabama. Deciding to go there suddenly became the right choice for Kanas instead of staying close to home at Central Florida but not having an adaptive track team to join.

"Once I saw that Alabama was going to be creating their own adaptive track-and-field team, I reached out to them and was able to get a tour of their facility and heard more about what they were planning on doing for when I came and I just loved the campus," Kanas said. "I picked that one pretty easily."

Kanas, now 21, just finished her junior year at Alabama, where she is majoring in mechanical engineering and looking to help design prosthetics. She recently competed at the World Para Athletics Grand Prix in Nottwil, Switzerland, where she took sixth in the shot put and second in the javelin in the women's F46 classification. She also won the women's javelin F46 competition last weekend at USATF Para National Championships in New York, setting a new season-best throw of 29.77 meters.

Kanas is a below-the-elbow amputee on her left arm due to an infection from when she was about 18 months old.

Alabama's program is in its infancy, but it's encouraging for Kanas that a school in the Southeastern Conference has added track as an adaptive sport. The Crimson Tide also have men's and women's wheelchair basketball as well as wheelchair tennis.

What started out as a four-person track team when Kanas hit campus as a freshman is now up to seven athletes. She appreciates being on the ground floor of something new.

"It is really cool to be a part of something that hopefully will continue on long after I leave," Kanas said. "It's awesome to be able to see. I was able to see their adaptive basketball programs and their tennis, and I think it's cool that they're branching out to other sports to really grow their program. I'm just was happy being a part of that."

Competing for a high-caliber sports program comes with many benefits, For Kanas, one perk stands out more than others. 

"Their weight room is just really awesome to train in," Kanas said. "They have the kind of technology to be able to track our progress and just the athletic trainer herself being able to adapt to our needs. With the wide range of (athlete) disabilities that the program has, it's really cool to see how she's able to accommodate for all of us."

However, there is a downfall. With adaptive programs so sparse across the nation, there are very few meets. For instance, the schedule on Alabama's website lists three indoor meets all against the same school, with two outdoor meets during the traditional college season and two more in the summer.

Kanas said Alabama was supposed to host a meet last season, but it was in conflict with the Desert Challenge Games, a well-established adaptive event in Mesa, Arizona.

"During the year, I thought it would be good to get more competitions to get a feel of that kind of environment," Kanas said. "That's definitely an improvement that I think we could have."

As with any fledgling program, Kanas also finds herself trying to get more athletes to come to her school.

"Every time we go to Move United Nationals, because those are where a lot of the younger athletes are, we've been trying to really talk with them and let them know more about our program," Kanas said. "Even at nationals, each of us have a couple friends that we've been talking to about adaptive sports at the college level and how Alabama has had a program for a couple years now. ... We've been really trying to get that information out there, so that other athletes know that there's options available."

Kanas is working on a few minor things to improve her performance in the shot put and javelin. She was encouraged with her showing at Nottwil as she had been dealing with a back injury that hindered her javelin throws.

Being able to be part of a team at Alabama has helped her maintain her focus on what is next in her career.

"The big goal for me right now is to train for LA in '28," Kanas said. "I'm really trying to work up to that, get javelin distances up. But also, I want to try to continue spreading the word about adaptive athletics in general because there's a lot of kids out there that don't know that there's even an option to be able to compete with other people with disabilities."