Merrimack's Cayden Dine tackles Bishop Guertin's Will Adams after a sizeable gain during Saturday night's Division I West Conference battle at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – It’s points aplenty for the Bishop Guertin High School football team so far this season.

The Cardinals just hope they can keep it that way. Saturday night they rolled over local rival Merrimack, 48-8 before a large Black Out Cancer Night crowd at Stellos Stadium. That gives the BG offense 83 points in two games.

“We started really fast in the scrimmage, in our first game (a 35-8 win over Pathfinder Tech) and now here,” Guertin coach Anthony Nalen said. “But we’ve got to be able to play four quarters. All the teams coming up, they’re going to be a lot closer.

“Offensively we were able to give it to different people, I think a lot of guys on the team can make plays. Try to get the ball in different people’s hands, different looks, and try to get the ball in space.”

And create a lot of space between them and the opposition on the scoreboard. The Cards rolled up over 400 total yards of offense the first half alone, after which BG led 41-8.

Guertin scored on six of its seven possessions in the first half, the only blemish an interception by Merrimack’s Sam Demas. Logan Curran scored to cap the first drive, a five play 45-yard march, on a 5-yard run. He got another, a 7-yard run with 7′:10 left in the opening period, and QB Nate Bowen ran 30 yards and kicked the PAT for a 21-0 lead with 3:54 left. He had another TD on a 5-yarder later in the half; before that he tossed a 15-yard strike to Kevin Izidorio early in the second. The Cards other TD in the first half was a 3-yard run by Jonah Feliciano.

Bowen did throw a second pick in the second half, but there’s no doubt he’s taken the next step after a sophomore year when his talents emerged. He completed 11 of 15 for 226 yards, two TDs and two INTs before the Cards inserted reserves, including freshman QB Gavin Harnum.

“I think it’s more mental than physical,” Nalen said of Bowen’s improvement. “He had that physical ability last year, I think it’s just more making more decisions with the ball, and putting our team in safer spots at times.”

Senior back Hudson Schmitt wrapped up the scoring with a 10-yard run in the fourth quarter, sending the game to running time.

On the flip side, Merrimack struggled mightily in the first half, but they did manage a second quarter TD on junior QB Maverick Torres’ 35-yard TD pass to Connor Page in the second quarter, with a Torres-to-Stephen Doyle 2-point conversion pass. That was it for the night.

“They (BG) had a real good game plan, defensively, and we had a hard time gaining some momentum and playing complementary football,” Tomhawks coach Kip Jackson, his team now 0-2, said. “It’s one thing for a team to score, but when you’re off the field after three plays, it makes it a challenge. … They (BG) were playing downhill the entire game. We had opportunities to make plays both offensively and defensively and just didn’t.”

“To be able to go out and do what we did in that first half,” Nalen said, “is what you want every time.”