ST. IGNATIUS - There's been a recent crime wave in St. Ignatius

as the innocent-looking sophomore Loren Erickson terrorized Charlo

with seven key steals as the Lady Bulldogs defeated the Lady

Vikings 30-23 on Thursday night.

ST. IGNATIUS - There's been a recent crime wave in St. Ignatius as the innocent-looking sophomore Loren Erickson terrorized Charlo with seven key steals as the Lady Bulldogs defeated the Lady Vikings 30-23 on Thursday night.

Mission High School might need to rebuff the gym floor too, as the number of bodies jumping for loose balls was significant in this Mission Valley rivalry.

"Charlo plays great man defense," head coach Les Rice said. "They don't give you a lot of shots and they play real physical. Every time we play Charlo it looks like that."

Mission was able to keep defensive pressure on the Lady Vikings and cause turnovers. The biggest thing was a sure sign of improvement that the Lady Bulldogs have been showing since the beginning of the year.

Mission jumped out to an early 11-5 lead, largely thanks to a 8-1 run to finish out the period. A low scoring second quarter ended with the Lady Bulldogs walking into the locker room at halftime with a 14-8 lead.

Mission would go on a 6-2 run to start the fourth quarter and would hold on to win 30-23. They were led by Kyla Mitchell who had 12 points. Stephanie Lewandowski also contributed six points.

Then on Saturday against Ronan, it was Erickson who came through again, this time a scoring career high 16 points as the Lady Bulldogs won 43-26.

"She was just on fire," Rice said.

The Maidens had the early 12-10 lead, but Mission bounced back with a 19-point second quarter for a 29-19 lead at halftime.

"We just had good allaround support from everybody," Rice said.

The Lady Bulldogs held Ronan to just one point in the third quarter, but scored just one point themselves in the fourth - something Rice blames on his own tinkering.

"Sometimes when it ain't broken don't fix it," Rice said.

Mission got solid contributions from Kyla Mitchell (8 points), Stephanie Lewandowski (6 points) and Breanna Steele (7 points).

"We are scoring some points and we're getting contributions from a whole lot of people," Rice said. "We're growing faster than I had anticipated."

After their matches this week, Mission will get Christmas break to prepare for the defending conference champion, Bigfork.