Nashua South's Josh Tripp scores the first TD of Friday night's Battle of the Bridge, despite the efforts of North's Kobe Perry during last year's Battle of the Bridge at Stellos Stadium. The two are likely to meet again tonight. (Telegraph file photo by TOM KING)

NASHUA – It’s that time again.

“I feel like it’s Week Four every year,” Nashua High School South football coach Josh Porter said of the annual Battle of the Bridge game vs. rival Nashua North. “Pencil it in. We’re looking forward to it. The boys are always fired up for the Battle of the Bridge.”

And that Battle for the Ed Lecius Memorial Trophy kicks off tonight at 6:30 p.m. at Stellos Stadium. When it comes to this game lately, one team has been way up and another heading down. South was like that (down) for a few seasons – one year was a 47-point rout – and North was like that a year ago, losing 41-10. Overall South leads the series 24-15 thanks to that win.

This year? The Panthers come in 2-1 overall, 1-1 in Division I. North was hoping to come in at 3-0 in the division, but was surprised 14-10 by Merrimack last week. The Titans are improved from a year ago, while South, which was a contender but lost in the quarterfinals, hope to be even better.

Will any of this matter? Nah.

“Every year it’s the same — you never know what can happen with the rival games,” Titans coach Chad Zibolis said. “Sometimes when a team could be 5-0 and a team could be 0-5, you come into that game and you never know what can happen … With a rival game, it just kind of gets crazy.”

That was the case last year when North had an early 10-6 lead before the Panthers woke up and ran away. Or in 2023 when the Panthers were underdogs but led 15-0 at halftime before North rallied for a 28-15 win.

“We say it every year, take your records every year and throw it way; North-South, there’s always some of the craziest moments with that,” said Porter, who has been an assistant the last few years but now has is first Bridge game as the head coach after longtime Panthers coach Scott Knight retired.

South has a lot of the talented players it had a year ago in quarterback Cody Jackson, back Sam Levine and wideout Josh Tripp. Add to that more touches from all-purpose player Justin Fish – three TD catches last week – and the offense is strong.

“Skill-wise they’re good; line, they’re good,” Zibolis said. “We hope we can control the line of scrimmage, that’s our main game with everything, control the line of scrimmage on eithe side of the ball. If we’re able to do that, that’s the start of it. Then we have to be able to stop their skills, and they’re unbelievable. Cody Jackson can break any run at any point. If we’re tackling the way we’re supposed to be and getting all 11 hats to the ball we’ll be fine.”

On the flip side, the Titans have the dual threat of two QBs, junior Brady O’Connor and senior Harrison Joshi. O’Connor is more of a passer and Joshi, a South transfer, is more of a pounder, which is how Zibolis likes to play. He has, among others, two good backs in seniors Kobe Perry and Jedwin Lluveres.

“Our first option is to run that football,” Zibolis said. “If we can keep the ball out of their hands we’d be in better shape.”

Porter knows the Panthers need to prepare or two quarterbacks.

“That’ll be a task in itself,” Porter said. “It’s almost like two different offenses when either of them are out there. … Coach Harris (North offensive coordinator Zach Harris) is getting creative, and using both (QBs) to their strengths which is cool to see.

“It’s going to be a lot of discipline on defense. Joshi always runs hard, that’s one of the things we always admired about him when he was with us.

“They’ve got a lot of powerful back. It’s going to be like playing Bedford, we’re going to have to tackle low.”

South’s secondary almost leads to the strategy for North to run it; the Panther secondary with Tripp, John McDevitt and Fish is incredibly tough to throw against.

Porter also was impressed that North, despite the loss, held a potent Merrimack offense to 14 points. The heart and soul of the North defense is senior edge rusher Jack Krulikowski, who is getting a lot of college looks. He’s averaging 10-12 tackles a game.

Both coaches will go with the flow. Turnovers will be a key; the Titans had that problem vs. Merrimack last week. “If we turn the ball over,” Zibolis said, “we’re in a world of trouble.”

And that can happen for either team with the emotions of the game. Adrenalin can go both ways.

“It’s trying to tell the kids to understand that it’s just any other game,” Zibolis said. “We all want to win that Battle of the Bridge but we as coaches have to look at it as just another game.”

The problem is, it isn’t. Time for the fun to begin before these two can get on with the rest of their respective seasons.