Payton Thorne has made some plays early on in his first career start for the Spartans.

Saturday morning it was revealed that Michigan State’s starting quarterback Rocky Lombardi would not be playing against Penn State. Though he made the trip, he was not dressed or taking part in warmups. That gave Thorne his first career start.

To his credit, Thorne is playing well early on against the Nittany Lions. That includes this impressive deep ball early in the second quarter.

After dropping back to pass, Thorne found Jalen Nailor running past his man and all the way behind Penn State’s coverage. He was wide open, and it was a picture-perfect deep ball thrown by Thorne.

It went down as Thorne’s first career passing score with the Spartans:

So far, Michigan State looks to be neck-and-neck with Penn State after getting blown out against Ohio State. We’ll see if it continues to be tight the rest of the way.