The best kicker is college football is Hawaii’s Kansei Matsuzawa, who learned his craft in part by studying YouTube videos.
“The Tokyo Toe” has made all 19 of his field goal attempts and all 19 of his extra points. Not only is he perfect, but Matsuzawa leads college football in made field goals by five over the next-closest kickers, Houston’s Ethan Sanchez and Eastern Michigan’s Rudy Kessinger.
Matsuzawa isn’t just making chip shots, either. He’s hit all seven of his attempts from 40-49 yards and even hit a long this year of 52 against Fresno State.
In addition, Matsuzawa has come through in the clutch numerous times. In the team’s 23-20 season-opening win against Stanford, Matsuzawa hit two field goals in the final 2:01, including a 38-yarder with no time remaining.
The 26-year-old Matsuzawa was born in Ichikawa, Japan. He went to Makuhari Sogo High School in Chiba, Japan and was a soccer star, serving as team captain.
Matsuzawa graduated high school in 2017. He had designs on playing soccer in college in Japan, but he did not pass his entrance exams. That led to a different path, which Jason Coskrey of the Japan Times.
“I used to play soccer in Japan until high school,” Matsuzawa said. “I was going to college to play soccer, but I failed the exam to get into college.”
“I had nothing for two years, and I didn’t like my life,” Matsuzawa added. “I grew up playing soccer, but I was kind of forced to stop. Then my dad gave me plane tickets to the West Coast of America. I did the trip alone, for like two weeks, and I watched my first football game over there.”
That was a preseason matchup between the then-Oakland Raiders and Los Angeles Rams in Aug. 2019, won by the Silver and Black, 14-3.
From then on, Matsuzawa decided on a new path.
“Then, I went home and took a few months, and football was still stuck in my head. I was like, ‘Oh, I think I want to be an NFL player.'”
So Matsuzawa took to YouTube to help learn kicking. His main inspiration was Jason Myers of the Seattle Seahawks, per comments to CNN Sports.
“It was one of the best moments in my life. D1 football in America and Japanese kid has big dream,” the young placekicker told CNN Sports (h/t Patrick Snell of CNN International). “In the beginning, when I was in Japan, I had no coaches. So, I feel like I have to do it myself.
“I used YouTube first. I was looking for an NFL player on YouTube. I would say (Seattle) Seahawks kicker Jason Myers. I’ve never met him before, but he actually texted me on Instagram after getting the winning field goal and that was amazing. I try to imitate the best of the best and that’s how I started.”
In 2021, Matsuzawa arrived in the United States, kicking for Hocking College, a community college in Nelsonville, Ohio. Along his incredible journey, Matsuzawa even cut his own hair to save money during his time in school, per Christian Shimabuku of Aloha State Daily. He also was just learning English at the time.
In 2022, Matsuzawa made 12-of-17 on field goals, including a 50-yarder.
In 2023, Matsuzawa transferred to Hawaii. One year later, he became the team’s kicker, making 12-of-16 field goals and all 32 of his PAT.
Now he’s been tremendous in 2025, and he’s helped Hawaii to a 5-2 record. Fans got to know him a little bit before the season when he was mic’d up during a preseason practice.
The team’s five-win total matches Hawaii’s victory mark from last year. A few of his games will ever be streamed in Japan.
Matsuzawa’s efforts led him to being named a Week 1 star from the Lou Groza Award, given annually to the bestcollege football placekicker by the Palm Beach County Sports Commission. He’s also been Mountain West Special Teams Player of the Week four times this year already.
Matsuzawa has already embarked on an incredible and inspiring journey, but it wouldn’t be a surprise if this keeps going, perhaps with the Lou Groza Award for the year and/or even a spot in the pros someday.
For now, Hawaii is looking to move to 6-2 (and 3-1 in the Mountain West) with a victory at Colorado State. Gametime is set for 7 p.m. ET on Saturday.
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