NATCHEZ — After losing two games against River Oaks last Friday, Trinity Episcopal faces three must-win games this week against Prairie View if it wants to stay in the hunt for the District 3-AA championship.

“These are very important games for us,” Trinity coach Matt Mason said. “We slipped up and lost two on Friday, so we need to take this week one game at a time and get some wins to stay up in top of the district race.”

District 3-AA arranges its

schedule so that each team

plays an opponent three times all in the same week, with the second and third games being a doubleheader.

The schedule is made that way to prevent one dominant pitcher from pitching all three games against an opponent, thereby gaining an advantage.

Trinity’s will face this week’s opponent — Prairie View — in a road game on Monday and then a doubleheader at home on Wednesday.

Trinity’s two losses on Friday dropped its overall record to 8-6 and its district record to 4-2, and Mason knows the importance of this week’s games.

“We’ve got to win this week if we want to have a chance at a district title,” Mason said. “Getting a sweep this week would be nice, but we’ve got to get at least two out of three to keep ourselves in the race.”

One advantage Trinity does have on other teams in its district is that they currently have no games to make up because of rain.

While every other school in the district had to postpone their games on Friday, Trinity was able to play its doubleheader against River Oaks after moving the start time up four hours to avoid the rain.

“We felt like it was important to get those games in,” Mason said. “Everybody else (in the district) has at least two and some have four games to make up. They’re going to get stacked up and it could cause them a problem with running out of pitching.”

Trinity had won five games in a row before dropping its first two district games on Friday.

A sudden reversal of fortune such as that might jar a young team’s confidence. But Mason believes his team will come back stronger this week.

“I expect us to get focused,” Mason said. “(Losing those games) might have been the wakeup call we needed. With a young team, you’re going to have your ups and downs. Friday was our down. From now on we’ve got to be able to get back up and play well.”