Bishop Guertin's A.J. Holmes has to deal with Nashua South's Sam Levine (9) and Colvin Levesque (5) during the regular season opener for both two months ago. They meet tonight in the first round of the Division I playoffs at Souehgan. (Telegraph file photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – One team will feel it righted the ship, and the other one will have nine months to try to do it.

That’s the deal with high school football playoffs, and is certainly the case for tonight’s Division I preliminary round game between No. 6 Nashua South and No. 11 Bishop Guertin, set for 6:30 p.m. at South’s home-away-from home, Souhegan High School’s Calvetti Field.

The winner advances to face No. 3 Londonderry in the quarterfinals next weekend. Meanwhile, Nashua North concluded its regular season with a resounding 34-14 win over Spaulding on Thursday.

Both South and BG come into this unhappy with what’s happened to them recently. The Panthers (6-2, 7-2 overall) have lost their last two, what because a blowout loss to Bedford and a sluggish 14-6 loss to Goffstown. Guertin, meanwhile, has also lost its last two, both on the road vs. Salem (42-21) and Merrimack (34-21). The Cards had a halftime lead vs. Salem (7-6) and went up early on Merrimack (7-0). But they simply couldn’t sustain it.

Besides a loss to Bedford, their other loss was to Nashua South in overtime, 21-15, a game in which BG almost pulled out at the final horn but a potential game-winning field goal was wide left. South then won in overtime.

“We’ve got to play better than last week,” Panthers coach Scott Knight said. “We want to keep playing. It’s playoff season. Win, keep practicing. Lose, turn in your gear. Our kids just love football, I think they have fun at practice, they work hard.

“We had some pretty bad mistakes last week (vs. Goffstown). Our kids are pretty motivated to right the ship.”

Meanwhile, the Cardinals’ ship has sprung leaks all over – in terms of injuries. According to BG coach Anthony Nalen, 11 starters have gone down over the last few weeks. They suffered a big blow when back Cole Reeves, who was becoming a threat, suffered a season-ending collarbone injury, and lost Alex Dolan as well. They surprisingly got back receiver Sam Fayad back, but he’s still a bit gimpy.

“It’s bad,” Guertin coach Anthony Nalen said, adding that his best lineman, Aaron Chmielecki, is also done for the year. “The list goes on.”

Knight talked to his players about the Bedford team that routed by Merrimack toward the end of the 2022 regular season, then came back and won four straight postseason games to win the championship and start what is a chance at a threepeat.

“I’m not saying we’re Bedford of that year, but we’re capable of playing real good defense,” Knight said. “And the crazy thing is with the amount of mistakes we made last week (vs. Goffstown), we still only gave up 14 points.”

South has been relatively healthy but lost a key player in receiver/defensive back Josh Tripp to a bad ankle injury. But Knight says he’s progressing, yet doubtful for tonight.

“We’re motivated to play better,” Knight said.”But teams that have run on us, they’re not putting a dent in our (defensive) line. … We need to slow down and play more disciplined.”

South is always ignited by the running and throwing of junior QB Cody Jackson, while BG has seen sophomore quarterback Nate Bowen progress into one of the state’s best as well. Back A.J. Holmes has been steady, but the Cards can’t overburden him.

“A lot falls on A.J.and Nate,” Nalen said. “A lot more has fallen on (Bowen’s) lap because of (the injuries). He’s starting to show some of his youth; as he continues to develop and matures he’ll be able to carry us instead of just being a part of it. But I do think he’ll be able to produce the way he has.

“I think with that (offensive) line and A.J., we have a puncher’s chance to try and keep the ball away (from South) and try to make it close like we did the first time,” Nalen said. “I don’t think A.J.,the way he’s built, can tote the rock 30 times. Just trying to have a less of the load with perhaps Nate carrying it a little bit more. … But when stuff starts to go haywire, there’s a lot of young guys looking around. All the leaders are on the sidelines on crutches. … But 5-4 and in the playoffs speaks volume for the underclassmen.”

And the Panthers haven’t been in the playoffs since 2020. “We’ve had a couple of lean years, been a little bit of a tough run, but I think we’re in a good spot now.”

One of the two will be in great spot after tonight.

NASHUA NORTH 34, SPAULDING 14

The Titans wrapped up the season in style, finishing at 3-7 with Dylan Noble leading the way with two touchdowns while Darius Smith, Luke Peters and Kobe Perry each had a TD. All were on the ground.

Spaulding fell to 2-8.