SHREWSBURY — It didn’t take long for the St. John’s Prep football team to regain dominant form coming off a bye week.

Behind a 21-point first quarter and a defensive masterpiece in the first half that didn’t allow a first down until 47 seconds remained, the Eagles (5-0) cruised to a 36-14 road win over St. John’s of Shrewsbury (2-3) in Catholic Conference play Saturday afternoon.

Freshman quarterback standout Chris Vargas (5-for-9, 83 yards) tossed all three of his touchdown passes in the first quarter before sharing reps with Deacon Robillard and John Budrow, taking advantage of numerous short fields the defense set the offense up with.

Merrick Barlow (three catches, 59 yards) and Jordan Toribio (79 total yards) each scored two touchdowns as St. John’s Prep took a 36-0 lead into halftime.

“We were coming off the bye, so I think the kids were excited to get back to real, live action,” said Eagles head coach Brian St. Pierre. “We challenged them to start fast. … I liked how we started and I liked how we finished. Any time you’re on the road, especially in a Catholic Conference game, you’ve got to be ready to go, they’ve got Catholic Conference-caliber kids. I thought our guys handled business pretty well today.”

Up until quarterback Dylan DiPietro (8-for-21, 63 yards, TD, 85 rushing yards) set up the Pioneers offense for a first-down run on their final drive of the first half, the St. John’s offense netted negative-two yards from scrimmage through five drives as the Eagles frequently broke into the backfield to force incompletions and tackles for loss. Alex Turrisi had two sacks as four of those drives resulted in three-and-outs, and the other drive ended in a safety that Thomas Lafferty generated by forcing an intentional grounding penalty in the end zone.

Their dominance rolled over into special teams, with SJP starting three of its touchdown drives in Pioneers territory. The other two didn’t start deeper than the Eagles’ 44.

“Our defense helps us,” Vargas said. “Getting the ball here on our side of the field and just doing what we do to score. … (We got) such a short range to get into the end zone.”

St. John’s Prep capitalized on each one, starting with a shovel pass to Toribio on a jet sweep that he took 40 yards for a touchdown on the offense’s second play.

Four different players rushed for at least 20 yards on the day, led by Jeffrey Quigley’s 74 yards on 10 carries to move the chains. And when the chains didn’t move on first or second down, the Eagles converted on each of their first six third down attempts.

That included a 23-yard touchdown pass from Vargas to Barlow in the first quarter, as well as a 27-yard Barlow TD on third-and-long from Robillard (4-for-8, 68 yards, TD) in the second.

Vargas’ 3-yard TD pass to Gael Garcia just over six minutes in made it 14-0 before Barlow scored his two touchdowns, and Toribio ran in a 7-yard touchdown right before the half.

“We put them under a lot of pressure in practice,” St. Pierre said. “I thought we were really efficient. … I thought the defense really stepped up and played well. They kept them back and kept getting us shorter fields, so I thought (it was) really good complementary football all around.”

The Eagles focused on getting players time on the field in the second half, of which St. Pierre was pleased to say nearly 70 players got time. SJP wouldn’t score again, but Leo Emerson ran well for 63 yards on 11 carries to lead the way.

The Pioneers gained momentum in the second half, scoring on a 25-yard touchdown pass from DiPietro to Cole Dipersio and a 14-yard TD pass to Dipersio from Mason Hadad.

The defense also forced an interception and a fumble, but it wasn’t nearly enough to overcome the blowout first half.