DES MOINES, Iowa — For Ravens kicker Billy Cundiff, the support of his teammates and the lessons learned from his Midwestern upbringing have helped keep the biggest miss of his career in perspective.

The 31-year-old Cundiff returned to his home state of Iowa on Sunday to accept an alumni award from Drake University in Des Moines, three weeks after he shanked a 32-yard field goal attempt with 11 seconds left in the AFC championship game that sent the New England Patriots to the Super Bowl.

Cundiff said his Ravens teammates had been even more supportive than he imagined.

“It’s been impressive. I expected a lot more backlash,” Cundiff said. “I had a lot of guys that kept telling me, ‘Look, I’ve made mistakes.’ Obviously, everyone sees my mistakes. That’s just the way it goes.”

Cundiff called the miss a “tough pill to swallow.” But it certainly wasn’t the first setback for an Iowa kid who blossomed from a wannabe quarterback at a non-scholarship FCS school to an All-Pro kicker.

Cundiff was a three-time all-state pick as a quarterback at Harlan High, a small-school football powerhouse in western Iowa, and kicked out of necessity. Cundiff had hoped to play quarterback at Drake, but he quickly discovered his future in football was as a kicker.

Cundiff was also a point guard for the basketball team who played sparingly, though he quit before his senior season to concentrate on football. He said the relative anonymity of kicking for the Bulldogs allowed him to get all his mistakes out of his system away from the spotlight.