Mizzou fan who went viral for kicking ball at Kansas sideline shares his story
AI-generated summary reviewed by our newsroom.
- Carter Arey intentionally kicked at Kansas bench during viral Border War moment
- Arey, a decorated adaptive athlete, used the moment to celebrate Mizzou pride
- Viral kick helped energize stadium crowd, as Mizzou surged to defeat Kansas 42-31
There’s a chance you may have known about Carter Arey before Saturday’s “Border War” football game, but if not, you certainly do now.
If not by name, by reputation after what he did Saturday at Faurot Field.
Arey won an Instagram contest that gave him an opportunity to win $25,000 by making a 45-yard field goal. He accepted the challenge but never intended to win the money, especially after learning the distance of the kick.
It was only on Friday night that Arey learned he’d be part of the contest, so he got up for a drink of water in the kitchen. It was there his plan was hatched.
“I was like, ‘OK, no one’s making that kick ever,’” Arey told The Star. “So when I went back into the bedroom, I just told (wife) Laura, I was like, ‘I’m not kicking it towards the end. I’m gonna kick it directly at the Kansas bench.’
“And I just really wanted to send a message, and the message was: ‘I hate you,’ more or less. And the state and the team disgust me, and a lot of Missouri fans, and that meant more to me than any type of money prize at the end.”
Video of that kick quickly went viral Saturday after Mizzou beat Kansas 42-31.
Arey knew he had little chance of making the kick, but that’s not because of his prosthetic right leg. As his personal website notes, Arey was born with Proximal Femoral Focal Deficiency, and the upper part of his femur bone was malformed. That resulted in one leg being shorter than the other.
His leg was amputated as a kid, but that didn’t stop him from reaching incredible atheltic success.
Arey was on the 2013 Team USA men’s wheelchair basketball squad that won the Americas Cup qualifier in Bogota, Colombia. After stepping away from that sport, he’s taken up golf, and in June he won the U.S. Adaptive Open qualifier in Rockwall, Texas. He shot a plus-2 73.
That qualified Arey for the 4th U.S. Adaptive Open Championship at Woodmont Country Club in Rockville, Maryland, on July 7-9. Alas, he missed the cut.
“It’s been fun,” he said. “I put a lot of work into it to see how good I could get. I’m naturally a good athlete, but golf and I get along. Just kind of, you know, working my way up the world rankings. And the results are starting to follow.”
Arey is ranked 74th in the world, so that athletic success is why you might have known him before Saturday.
There is little question you know him now.
“At the heart of hearts of this whole thing is like, I just wanted to play a part in the rivalry that meant so much to me my entire life,” Arey said. “You have a lot of stories about Norm Stewart not spending a nickel in the state of Kansas, like my family followed that rule. So it was just a way for me to be involved and to play a part and have some fun with it, too.”
Arey is well-aware of how the game changed following his kick of destiny. Mizzou was down 21-15 at the time, but the Tigers outscored the Jayhawks 27-10 after.
“I do believe it got the crowd back into it, because we were pretty down and out at that moment, and didn’t really know what we were watching yet,” he said. “Like, the stats were stacking up in our favor, but the score wasn’t. And so it’s kind of one of the disappointing feelings of: What’s happening? But it definitely got the crowd into it and back in, locked into it.”
‘A true son’ of Missouri
Arey may have changed the future of on-field/on-court contests, because there’s bound to be someone who follows his lead in some sport.
For Arey, he was just doing his part as a Mizzou fan, a school he’s loved for the entirety of his 35 years on this earth.
While he feels bad for duping the contest organizers, who hustled him off the field, he doesn’t regret his decision (or painting his chest with that anti-KU message). And judging by the reaction he’s received from friends, family and other fans, he’s become a cult hero in Columbia, where he lives.
“I got recognized the rest of the afternoon, the whole night,” Arey said. “I mean, hundreds of text messages. And just being recognized as a true son for the rest of my life, that’s pretty cool. And being associated with someone who was at this game, someone that hates Kansas, just means a lot. It’s very cool.”
This story was originally published September 7, 2025 at 4:14 PM.
