Nashua South's Isabel Pincanco fires a shot despite the efforts of North's Sophia Wine during Monday night's annual Battle of the Bridge at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – The first month of the Division I field hockey season, the Nashua High School South Panthers have proven they can score.

And Nashua North has proven it can defend, but not score.

Offense prevailed on Monday night, as the Panthers blanked the Titans 3-0 in the annual Battle of the Bridge at Stellos Stadium.

“I think just everybody just owned their role and did their job tonight,” Panthers coach Ciki McIntire said. “They were really relying on each other. It’s always an emotional game. And it’s never easy.”

South got the game’s first goal when Addison Borden converted a pass from Keegan Dolan about eight minutes into the game.

That 1-0 South lead stood for the remainder of the half, but then Sofia Forti passed through traffic and Brooke Berger redirected in about 1:10 into the second half for a 2-0 lead. With the Titans, still winless (0-8) and unfortunately scoreless for the season thus far with a lot of inexperience, that was too big of a difference to overcome.

Or was it? North had its moments. It looked like the Titans would get their first goal of the season on a shot by junior Jordin Lopez, who was a bulldog on offense, with 13:26 left in the game. But officials ruled the shot came from outside the circle and hit South goalie xxxxx.

“She’s awesome,” North coach Kat Previte said of Lopez. “She’s fast, she’s a really strong offensive push for us.”

“They wanted it more than we did at the beginning of the fourth quarter,” McIntire said. “I thought they were going to score a couple there.”

It’s easy to see how North has given some teams some trouble because goalie Anya Seo, a senior in her first year playing in goal, has stood tall. She had 16 saves last night.

“She’s a natural athlete,” Previte said. “She’s so good.”

But the Titans simply couldn’t keep the Panthers at bay. They were missing center mid Madelyn Dratch (concussion) and that may have made it easier for South to get in transition.

“They moved to the ball a lot faster than we did,” Previte said. “They were getting in front of us and we weren’t getting in front of them. They were taking really fast free hits, too, which threw us off a little bit.”

North goalie Anya Seo makes one of her 16 saves in front of South’s Brooke Berger during Monday night’s Battle of the Bridge at Stellos Stadium. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

McIntire said she was almost going to call a time out when North made its fourth quarter push, “but then we kind of got back into our groove.” And that resulted with the final goal, a shot by Isabel Picano assisted by Berger.

Wylie Hart played well at midfield for South, igniting the offensive transition. Dolan played all over the field, while other players like Maddie Langer, Molly Mulaney, Meenu Dwaraka and Maggie Schmidt also made a difference. Goalie Meury Navarette had five saves, proof that the Titans weren’t sitting back.

“We’re getting there,” Previte said. “Little steps. It’s going to take a little bit.”

But it was still a Battle, and for local field hockey, that’s a good thing.