For the second year in a row, the St. Aloysius Flashes have painted themselves into a corner.

St. Al (0-7, 0-1 District 3-AAA) has three games left in the season, and its playoff hopes will ride on each and every one. St. Al needs to win all three, beginning with Friday’s home game against Manchester Academy, to have a chance at the District 3-AAA championship and a berth in the MAIS Class AAA playoffs.

It’s the same scenario the Flashes faced in 2015, when they did win all three to win the district title. Coach BJ Smithhart, though, was more worried about ending his team’s season-long losing streak than running the table.

“We’ve got to stop looking ahead. We’ve just got to worry about one quarter, and one play at a time,” Smithhart said.

Manchester (5-2, 3-0) can clinch the District 3-AAA championship by beating St. Al on Friday. The Mavericks won one game a year ago and can guarantee their first winning season since 2011 with a victory.

“They’ve done a really good job. They’re well-coached and are the most improved team in our district, by far,” Smithhart said. “They’re older. They had a bunch of ninth- and 10th-graders last year and it’s sophomores and juniors now. It’s just the growing up aspect of it. It’s like us a few years ago.”

St. Al, meanwhile, has seemingly fallen off a bit since winning last year’s district title. The Flashes have struggled to hold leads or find consistency against a difficult schedule. They’ve blown second-half leads in four of their seven losses and have yet to put a complete game together on both offense and defense.

Twice, the Flashes allowed 20 points or less but failed to score more than 14. Three times they’ve allowed 50 or more while playing well on offense.

The reasons for the inconsistency have varied from week to week, Smithhart said, but boiled down to one common thread.

“Playing good football teams is part of it,” Smithhart said with a chuckle. Only one of St. Al’s seven opponents has a losing record. “The last couple of teams we played haven’t been short on talent. Giving up big plays has played into it, too.”

Last week, in a 55-21 loss to Greenville-St. Joseph, the Flashes allowed five touchdowns of 30 yards or more. The previous week, in a 50-32 loss to Adams County Christian, they gave up a 65-yard interception return and a 70-yard touchdown run.

“It snowballed on us in a hurry the last couple of weeks, and really all year. It’s not like somebody is taking out chunks of yards,” Smithhart said. “The defense played well against Adams County. It was the special teams plays and an interception return. Last week we had some matchup problems and they hit some big pass plays on us.”

Manchester is another in a line of quality opponents, but Smithhart did feel like it was a better matchup for the Flashes — less athletic, more straightforward in their approach, yet still skilled at what they do.

“They’re different and very well-coached, but not as athletic as what we’ve been seeing,” Smithhart said. “They’re more of a pound it type team.”