By JOHNNY PEPPO

Sports Editor

East St. John looked to be off on the right foot when they took a 1-0 lead over Ruston in the top of the first inning Tuesday afternoon in their bi-district road game with the Bearkats. But ESJ couldn’t keep up their offense while the Ruston squad used early scores to take a 5-2 victory, dropping the Wildcats from the playoffs and ending their season with a 13-14 record.

It was the curse of the north Louisiana districts again for 5-5A as Ruston topped East St. John. The same result came for the boys basketball teams when the two schools met this season, as did the girls basketball and softballs team when they took on Airline in their season finales. The Wildcats again put up a fight for this one, their second consecutive playoff appearance, threatening to rally in the top of the seventh when they were down by four runs. A home run by Raymond Anderson wasn’t enough offense to get ESJ through though, and the Bearkats advanced to the regional round where they are set to face Barbe.

Destrehan, who East St. John fell to in a 5-5A runner-up tie-breaker, advanced past Byrd with an 11-1 win Wednesday through four and a half innings of play. DHS put up 11 runs in the bottom of the first to coast to the win. Destrehan moves through to the quarter-finals where they will travel to see New Iberia. Hahnville, the district champions over ESJ and DHS, were toppled though by district 1-5A wildcard Airline in a 10-1 final.