The Yankees entered Friday night in third place in the AL East.

Only a loss by the Blue Jays kept them out of fourth.

With an offense that was largely shut down yet again, the Yankees lost their first game of the season against the Red Sox, 5-2 at Yankee Stadium.

Michael King allowed a three-run homer to Rafael Devers in the top of the first, and the Yankees’ offense didn’t produce a run until the sixth, when they were trailing by five runs.

“We got ourselves into some situations to score, we just couldn’t get that big one tonight,” Aaron Boone said after the Yankees were held hitless again with runners in scoring position.

The game ended with Gary Sanchez striking out for the fourth time of the night and a season-high crowd of 18,040 in The Bronx cascading the Yankees with boos. The latest loss kept the Yankees behind both the front-running Rays and the resurgent Red Sox.

“You never want to be here,’’ Aaron Judge said before the game. “Going into [the season], you expect to be in first. We haven’t been doing that. It’s still a long season. … A lot of things can happen; a lot of things can change.”

So far, they haven’t. The offense has been mostly dormant throughout the first third of the season and the pitching has been unable to pick up the team in the interim.

And Tampa Bay and Boston are proving to be tough foes once again.

The Red Sox tattooed King in the top of the first, with Alex Verdugo and Xander Bogaerts lining singles before Devers belted a two-out, three-run shot into the second deck in right on an 0-2 four-seam fastball that wasn’t elevated enough.

The Yankees threatened against ex-Yankee Nathan Eovaldi in the bottom of the inning. DJ LeMahieu and Giancarlo Stanton opened with singles, but Judge grounded into a double play and Gio Urshela lined out to center.

“When you’re not hitting a ton of long balls, you’ve got to be able to cash in on those opportunities,” Boone said.

The Yankees also matched a season-high by striking out 15 times.

“Strikeouts are a part of this,’’ Boone said. “We’ll continue to work hard in those situations where we have some traffic and hopefully break through.’’

King settled down after the first inning and struck out the side on nine pitches in the fourth, just the seventh time that’s happened in Yankees history.

“It was cool,” King said. “But I’d rather win a game.”

King was pulled for Lucas Luetge with Devers coming up with one out in the sixth. Luetge got Devers to fly to center, but Hunter Renfroe singled and Marwin Gonzalez doubled down the left field line, scoring two more runs to give the Red Sox a 5-0 lead.

The Yankees’ offense finally showed up in the bottom of the sixth against Eovaldi.

A single by LeMahieu was erased by a Stanton double play, the Yankees’ major league-worst 54th of the season. But Judge homered to right to get the Yankees on the board.

Gio Urshela and Gleyber Torres followed with back-to-back singles to left, and the Red Sox stuck with Eovaldi. The right-hander got Rougned Odor to hit a grounder to the right side of the infield. Gonzalez went to his right to try to make the play, but the ball bounced off his glove and away from him. He threw the ball away, and Urshela scored while Torres went to third, as the Yankees got to within 5-2.

The rally ended there, though, as Clint Frazier flied to center, part of a bottom of the lineup that went 0-for-15 with 10 strikeouts.

“It just hasn’t come easy for us offensively so far,’’ LeMahieu said. “We know what’s at stake. We know when our offense is going, it can carry us.”

The loss snapped the Yankees’ 11-game home winning streak against the Red Sox— which included a 9-1 record against Boston in last year’s shortened season.

“I know it’s a tough moment right now,” Torres said. “I get it. We competed. I know the time is coming for us.”