Sweet Home lost 6-5 at home to Newport Thursday in softball to finish the season second place in the Oregon West Conference.
Philomath is the league champion.
The loss followed an 11-0 shutout at Sisters on May 8.
The finish sends the Huskies to the playoff bracket on May 22. Coach Karyn Hartsook does not know who they will face.
Rankings were not final until after games finished Monday. First-round playoff games Thursday also may impact Sweet Home’s opponent on the bracket.
The Huskies are “obviously disappointed” about missing the top spot in league, Hartsook said, “but Philomath’s a good team. We needed to win more games than we did.”
Moving into playoffs, “we’re going to focus on making sure we are solid on everything we can control,” Hartsook said, hitting, pitch selection and solid defense.
Against Newport, “we were up four-nothing,” said Coach Karyn Hartsook. “We needed to hit consistently. You can’t leave runners on base. Our defense was fine. We had opportunities to score. We just didn’t do it.”
At bat, Ashtyn Walker went 3-4 to lead the Huskies. She had one run. Allison Miner went 2-3 with a run and an RBI. Sunhee Bitter went 2-4.
The Huskies quickly finished off Sisters, scoring four runs in the first inning, three in the second, four in the third and one in the fourth to win under the 10-run rule in the fifth inning.
The Huskies collected 13 hits, led by Walker who went 3-3 with two doubles, five RBIs and one run and Emily Brown who went 3-3 with a run.
Zanona went 2-3 with a double, three runs and one RBI.
Also hitting were Bitter, Marissa Kurtz, Savannah Hutchins, Chloe Fairchild and Allison Miner. Kurtz had two RBIs.
Savannah Hutchins, Walker and Maddie Haris combined to give up two walks and two hits and to strike out eight batters.