Nashua North's Junior Reyes (7) and Windham's Rocco Ponzini follow the ball during the Titans' 3-1 win Thursday at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – David Pereria could feel something was a little different Thursday afternoon at sun-splashed Stellos Stadium as he and his Nashua High School North boys soccer teammates were getting ready prior to their game vs. Windham.

“You could feel it in the warmups and everything,” Pereria said.

The ‘it’ was the pressure of trying to avoid an 0-3 start to the young season, which the Titans did as the senior Pereria scored two goals in a 3-1 win.

Pereria got the go-ahead goal with three minutes left in the first half, and added an insurance goal in the second half. But he and his North teammates felt more at ease when Aiden Valcourt stormed through the Jaguar midfield on his own and buried a breakaway shot just 27 seconds in.

“After that first goal, the team felt happy and everything, that’s our first (non penalty kick) goal of the season,” he said. “So that definitely settled some of the nerves. After that we decided to take off.”

“That was a big momentum change to be able to get that right off the bat,” North coach Jeremy Zelanes said. “Especially coming off two losses where we put up one goal but that was a penalty kick. It showed the guys wanted to come up and respond to losing two games and play together. The biggest thing was they had fun.”

This is a North team that recovered from a similar slow start last season to make the Division I tourney, record two upsets – including a quarterfinal win over the Jags – before being ousted 1-0 by eventual champ Bedford in the semis here. There was no way the Titans wanted to repeat that start and make things more difficult for themselves right away.

“The schedule is very unforgiving early in the season,” Zelanes said. “Starting out 0-2 is a learning moment, a chance for us to go back and figure out what’s it going to look like for the season. The key was coming out and responding.”

“When you give up a goal 30 seconds in, and your chasing the game 30 seconds in on a launched ball upfield, right there you start 1-0 and we don’t know how good either team is,” Jags coach Mike Hachey said.

Windham (1-2), which got hit hard by graduation did tie things up at 15:58 on a goal by Noah Bustamante. But if giving up a goal in the first few seconds wasn’t bad enough, the Jags had to watch Pereira pounce on a loose ball he helped steal and blast one into the far corner, beating Jags keeper Matt Mosely with 3:02 left in the half to give the Titans a 2-1 lead they wouldn’t give up.

“He’s on fire this year,” Zelanes said. “He came ready to play. In the off-season, he came up to me and said he wanted to be more of a scoring threat this year, and he did just that.”

“I was able to prove today I could actually finish,” Pereria said. “I’m proud of that.”

North had nine corner kicks in the game, and dominated time of possession in the second half, as keeper Tyler Byrne (two saves) didn’t need to do a whole lot except direct traffic for his defense.

Nashua North’s David Pereira, center, celebrates with his teammates after his second goal in Thursday’s game vs. Windham at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

Nashua North’s David Pereira, center, celebrates with his teammates after his second goal in Thursday’s game vs. Windham at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

At the 50:38 mark, Pereria got the ball deep in the corner, then pivoted into an open space and found the far left corner for the 3-1 lead. It was over.

“When the third goal happened, there was quit in our team,” Hachey said. “I don’t know if it was fatigue or not; one team deflated and the other elevated.”

“I told them at halftime that the first five minutes coming off after the half were crucial, making sure we keep our shape and play our game,” Zelanes said. “We needed to lock in for those first five minutes.”

And, with their first win, Zelanes feels his team is locked in now to forge ahead.