NOTEBOOK / KIRBY LEE : Erickson Earns Honors With Catches

Quality, Aaron Erickson well tell you, is more important than quantity. It’s not how often you do something, but how well you do it that counts.

Apparently, the folks who award most valuable player honors in the Glendale-Burbank All-Star Football Game agree because they honored the Crescenta Valley receiver after he made just two catches in last Saturday’s game at La Canada High.

Both catches, however, were instrumental in Glendale’s 14-7 win. Erickson reeled in a seven-yard touchdown pass from Flintridge Prep quarterback Chris Bisgaard late in the third quarter for the deciding touchdown two plays after his 40-yard reception moved the ball to the Burbank 9-yard line.

Expanding horizons: Playing in their last high school football game, Bisgaard and Flintridge Prep teammate David Swayne, bound for Duke, got their first taste of 11-man football.

Bisgaard and Swayne helped lead Flintridge Prep to the Southern Section Eight-Man Large Schools Division title last fall, sharing player of the year honors.

“(The adjustment) wasn’t that hard,” said Bisgaard who connected with Swayne on a 27-yard pass on the game-winning drive. “I’ve been throwing in practice at Glendale College and I’m getting used to it. The field is wider and it’s a lot easier to hit receivers. It’s actually a lot of fun.”

Knockout: Erickson had chided Bisgaard about coming from an eight-man school, but that behavior stopped before the first practice was completed.

“Chris has an arm on him,” Erickson said of Bisgaard. “The first day of practice . . . one of the balls slipped right through my hands and gave me a black eye. He really rocketed it in there.”

Double elimination: The La Canada and Crescenta Valley boys’ basketball teams lost in the fourth round of the L.A. Games last weekend.

La Canada fell to Morningside on a desperation three-point shot at the buzzer. Manual Arts downed Crescenta Valley, 87-23.

Goal-oriented: Chris Bruyere of Glendale is among 68 players from across the nation who will compete for 24 berths on the U.S. junior national hockey team next week at Colorado Springs, Colo.

Bruyere, 16, played for the Culver City-based California Junior Kings. Last season, the 5-foot-10, 155-pound center had 30 goals and 47 assists in 40 games .

Bruyere attended Hoover High, but will transfer in the fall to Berkshire Prep in Massachusetts to improve his chances for a Division I hockey scholarship.

Clinic: Dennis Green of Stanford and Bruce Snyder of Cal are among the football coaches who will speak at a clinic sponsored by the Shrine Football Classic. The clinic is July 28 from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.

Green will speak about rebuilding a program and Snyder will focus on the running game.

Other coaches and their topics include USC defensive coordinator Tom Roggeman, inside linebackers and defense; Thousand Oaks Coach Bob Richards, staff structure and off-season workouts; Franklin Coach Armando Gonzalez, short-yardage passing; Fontana Coach Dick Bruich (defense).

Information: (213) 749-0166.

Bound for CSUN: Dave Swanson, an All-Western State Conference forward last season for the Glendale College basketball team, has accepted a scholarship from Cal State Northridge.

Swanson, who finished second in the state in the high jump and has a personal best of 7 feet, 1/2 inch, will also compete in track for CSUN.

Gary Klein contributed to this notebook.