​EAST LANSING – Liam Boyd lined up for his first field goal attempt and drilled it straight and true, right through the uprights, from 32 yards away.A few minutes later, he backed up from 42 and knocked through another. And then a little farther, from a career-long 48 yards out.By the time Michigan State football’s 30-20 win over Toledo ended Friday, Sept. 4, the transfer kicker had half as many field goals in his Spartan debut as he had in three other stops over the past four seasons combined.“I was just telling him that I was looking for him every time he came off the field after making a kick,” wide receiver Rodney Bullard Jr. said. “I told him that he was saving us. We had a lot of times where we couldn’t capitalize when we should have and he had our back.”Boyd extended his personal record with a 51-yarder late in the fourth quarter to seal coach Pat Fitzgerald’s opening-night win with MSU. It was part of the strong night of play in the third phase by the Spartans in their first game under Fitzgerald and new special teams coach LeVar Woods.“I think with special teams,” Fitzgerald said, “you can see the method to my madness tonight.”Even with the program’s long history of successful specialists, Boyd’s career high was the most by any MSU kicker in his debut and just the fifth time in school history a Spartan booted five field goals. Only Jonathan Kim, with six against Woods and Iowa in 2024, had more in a single game.Boyd and Kim just missed being teammates at North Carolina. Boyd, a fifth-year senior, began his career at Clemson in 2022 and transferred to the Tar Heels in 2023 after Kim left to join the Spartans. Boyd made his only field goal try and all seven of his point-after attempts in 2024 at UNC in three games. The 6-foot-1, 200-pound native of Ashville, North Carolina, transferred again to Charlotte last season and arrived at MSU after going 9-for-12 with the 49ers, including a long field goal of 42 yards, and connecting on all 15 PATs.READ MORE: MSU ‘got punched in the mouth’ by Toledo. But Spartans found their way to 1-0“It means the world,” said Boyd, who arrived after MSU’s 2025 kicker Martin Connington transferred to Kansas. “I’m just so happy to be here and be surrounded by great teammates and great coaches. And they all put me in a position to succeed, and I’m really thankful for that.”The only blemish for Boyd came on a 54-yard attempt in the third quarter that was blocked. Still, it was a decision Fitzgerald rationalized afterward as what he wants to be a program-defining ethos moving forward.“I got a little aggressive with the long field goal, but scared money doesn’t make money. I’m not here to win a punting contest,” Fitzgerald said. “Maybe I have to in a game, I got that. But I wanted to be aggressive tonight – not reckless, but I wanted to be aggressive. I’m looking to make money, if you know what I mean.”That time to punt came one possession after Boyd got blocked. New punter R