During times of hardship, we sometimes struggle to find the momentum to carry us forward.

When Peter and Aaron Berry were confronted with one of the most difficult experiences in their lives, that impetus to persevere came in the form of wheelchair basketball.

The brothers were first introduced to the sport in 2011. Peter, 9 at the time, and Aaron, 8, were just months into physical rehabilitation after sustaining nearly identical spinal cord injuries during a car accident that left them both paralyzed from the waist down.

The boys, their parents, and their 5-year-old sister Willa were on their way home from a family road trip when another vehicle veered into their lane on the highway. The head-on crash claimed the lives of their parents, Josh and Robin, and left all three children injured. Peter and Aaron were found in critical condition, Aaron having fractured a vertebra in his neck in addition to the severe spinal cord damage.

After undergoing life-saving surgeries in Texas following the accident, the brothers were transferred to Shriners Children's Chicago where they underwent months of rehabilitation therapy. During recreation time in therapy, Peter and Aaron were introduced to several adaptive sports, including wheelchair basketball.

“Basketball was probably our greatest distraction from the challenges that were in front of us,” Peter said. “(It) allows you to forget the outside world … which might be exactly what you need when going through something so traumatic.”

Once released from Shriners Children's hospital, Peter and Aaron moved home with their aunt and uncle, who now were raising the Berry siblings alongside their own children. It wasn't long before their uncle took them to watch a community wheelchair basketball game. After the game, he asked one of the coaches how Aaron and Peter could get involved with the team.

"Show up at the next practice," the coach told him.

They did just that, "and the rest is history," Aaron said.

The sport quickly became a constant for the boys during this period of transition and recovery.

"When we got into our sports wheelchairs for the first time after our accident, it was so liberating," Peter said. "There was no way not to fall in love with it. We regained all the freedom of movement and speed that we thought we had lost."

Basketball helped them relieve stress and escape from the world for a little while.

"It's loud. It's fast-paced. It requires a lot of concentration and communication," Aaron said. "You really have no room to think about stress or anything else."

The Berry brothers joined the Houston TIRR Memorial Hermann Junior Hotwheels basketball team, advancing quickly and contributing to three National Wheelchair Basketball Association National Championship wins.

“We took off with it and never looked back,” Peter said. “We were grateful and blessed to have an amazing team in Houston and a coach who pushed us beyond our known limits. It’s opened so many doors.”

Behind one of those doors for both Peter and Aaron were full scholarships to join the Alabama Adapted Athletics program and play men’s wheelchair basketball for the University. Since coming to the Capstone, they have thrived in the classroom and on the court, practicing and bonding with their teammates and coaches.

"It's more than just basketball to me. It created a lot of friendships, relationships, and brotherly bonds," Aaron said.

In 2023, the Tide men's wheelchair basketball team won the NIWBT National Championship, and in 2022, Peter and Aaron were both chosen to represent Team USA at the International Wheelchair Basketball Federation (IWBF) Men’s Under 23 (U23) World Championship in Thailand.

Peter, now 23, earned his bachelor's degree in marketing and communications in Spring 2024 and is now a graduate student studying marketing with a focus on professional sales. He attended the 2024 Paralympic Games in Paris as an official alternate for the U.S. men's wheelchair basketball team and also said he is interested in playing professionally overseas.

Aaron, 21, is a senior in marketing and has an interest in music production. Like Peter, he said he wants to play basketball overseas, but, for now, he is "taking things as they come."

This positive, one-day-at-a-time mentality has helped propel both brothers forward through the years.

“I don’t know what gifts our parents gave us to just be able to stay positive throughout that time, but it was one of the biggest things that kept us moving. ‘Take it step by step.’ That was always the mindset,” Peter said. “It was always, ‘Well, there has to be a light at the end of the tunnel, and if I can’t see it now, that just means the journey is not over.’”