MONTEREY, La. &045; So much for a potential showdown with Harrisonburg for the District 3-B title.

Monterey fell short of its district title hopes with a loss Tuesday to Forest, ensuring the Lady Wolves will be the No. 2 seed from the district in the upcoming LHSAA playoffs. Had Monterey won, it would have forced a playoff with Harrisonburg later this week for the district title. With the loss, the Lady Wolves just have to sit back and wait to see who they will face in the postseason.

&uot;We’ll just keep practicing until we find out who and when we play,&uot; Monterey head coach Hazel Brallier said.

Forest (5-3, 16-10) beat Monterey (6-2, 15-9-1) 2-1, avenging a loss earlier this season and all but ensuring the Lady Bulldogs will make the playoffs as a wild card, Forest head coach Steve Harris said.

&uot;We’ve got to be in,&uot; Harris said. &uot;There’s only 11 districts and one of them only has one team. There’s no way we could not get (a wild card). Now we might not like who we play, if it’s Simpson or someone, but we should be in. The next thing they look at is overall winning percentage and I feel like we’re good there. Our goal at the beginning of the year was to get to the playoffs, to give these girls a sniff of what it’s like there.&uot;

After surviving some tough situations early in the game, Monterey might have felt this game was its to lose.

Trailing 2-0 heading into the fifth inning, the Lady Wolves finally got a run when Krysta Seigle singled, stole second and went to third on a throwing error. Heather Robertson singled her home and moved to third.

But the Wolves had another chance to send the game to extra innings. With two outs in the seventh, Monterey got consecutive singles from Siegle, Whitney Roark and Robertson. But Siegle was out when the Lady Bulldogs went home on Kassie Kennedy’s fielder’s choice and Whitney Price struck out to end the ballgame.

Robertson, the team’s only senior, was 3-4 in the final home game of her career.

Forest had some chances early to put more runs on the board but couldn’t take advantage. The Lady Bulldogs loaded the bases in each of the first two innings, forcing the Lady Wolves to throw to home plate where Monterey catcher Kassie Kennedy forced out the runner, preventing the Lady Bulldogs from scoring.

&uot;It’s a big relief (to get out of that situation). Early on when they got the bases loaded we got out of it both times,&uot; Brallier said. &uot;It wasn’t those errors that cost us the game.&uot;

After Forest’s first three batters all reached base in the first inning, Kennedy got the first out on Forest’s Jessie Paris, setting up a double play that got the Lady Wolves out of the inning. In the second, Kennedy forced out Forest’s Anna Reardon to end the inning, again without scoring.

&uot;Things didn’t work out for us there,&uot; Harris said. &uot;We got the bases loaded twice and left five batters on. All our runs came in what seemed like less dangerous situations, with two outs and no one on base.&uot;

But though Monterey survived some poor defense in the first two innings, it was the fifth

inning that did in the Lady Wolves. With two outs, Forest started hitting the ball. Kristena Frazier singled and scored on Jessica Copes’ double. Copes moved to third on a wild pitch and scored on Leah Prine’s single, giving the Lady Bulldogs all the scoring they would need in the game.

Monterey had its own chances to score early in the game but also failed to convert. With two outs in the second, the Lady Wolves got consecutive singles from Roark, Robertson and Kennedy to load the bases. But Price struck out to leave the Lady Wolves scoreless.

&uot;We had the bases loaded too early on,&uot; Brallier said. &uot;We didn’t get the hits when we needed them. The girls didn’t give up. They kept battling and trying to get something going.&uot;

Forest got a solid performance from its pitcher, seventh grader Paris. Harris said his top two pitchers are both seventh graders and five of his starters are in seventh or eighth grade.