HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL : Renewing Acquaintances : Rivalry: After cooling their heels for two years, Notre Dame and Crespi are set to meet again.

A statue of Mary, mother of Jesus, was defaced at Notre Dame High. A year later, some highly unflattering words about Notre Dame were burned into the school’s lawn and caused quite a stir among the school’s clergy.

The same year, a pickup truck allegedly occupied by Notre Dame students roared past the Crespi parking lot and unloaded an arsenal of water balloons onto a group of previously dry Crespi students.

And very shortly after that, late in 1987, one of the Valley’s most intense and stirring football rivalries came to a sudden halt. A game that annually attracted as many as 5,000 fans was no more.

“Athletics are not that important that we act toward each other like we’re not even Christians,” proclaimed Sister Christopher Miller, a former Notre Dame vice principal.

Never mind that the fairly regular practice in football of trying to separate a ballcarrier from his head doesn’t seem to be condoned anywhere in the Bible, either. But Miller had a point to make, a point with which any decent person would agree.

Defacing a religious statue is an ignorant and hateful act, any time, any place.

And anyone who chars obscenities into someone’s lawn is likely lugging around the IQ of a pine tree.

As for water balloons . . . well, water balloons are always funny.

No one died because of the rivalry, and no one was injured, either.

But the relationship with Crespi, Notre Dame decided, was a bad one. Notre Dame called for a two-year “cooling-off” period and jumped from the Del Rey League to the San Fernando Valley League, apparently to get away from the Celts.

The cooling-off period has ended. Tonight, inside a Pierce College stadium that is expected to rock with 5,000 or more fans, the two most prominent Catholic schools in the Valley will bang helmets once again. Crespi leads the series, 11-4, and won the most recent meeting, 54-14, in 1987.

Both schools returned to the Mission League this year and at stake tonight is the league championship. Notre Dame is 6-2-1 overall, 4-0-1 in league play, and can clinch at least a tie for the title with a victory. Crespi is 7-2, 4-1 and has a shot at the crown if it wins and St. Paul is beaten.

But just knocking Notre Dame out of a chance for the title might give the Celts enough satisfaction.

“I don’t know if two years of cooling off was long enough. I don’t know if 20 years would be long enough,” said Rich Lawson, a former Notre Dame player and coach who is now the head coach at Chaminade. “I don’t know that any cooling-off period was appropriate. There would seem to be other ways of handling the extracurricular problems than shelving the whole rivalry. The administration should be able to deal with those things.”

Chaminade Athletic Director Bernie Kyman, a longtime observer of sports in the Valley, has a similar opinion.

“My feeling is that any games that create large fan support are good,” he said. “The administration then has the responsibility of controlling any problems. There will be more than 5,000 fans at this game, and that has to be good for everyone.”

At Notre Dame, the principal seemed to be feeling a bit of pressure as the game approached.

“I was misquoted badly two years ago and am really shy about saying anything,” Brother Stephen Walsh said. “Let’s leave it like this: I would rather make no comment about any of this.

“However, I feel very comfortable with playing football against Crespi and look forward to this game and being in the same league again. I have a lot of respect for Crespi High School, and I am not interested in going over all the past problems.

“Nobody was fine and pure in all of our past problems. But to go back over the whole thing, I just won’t do that.”

Two years ago, Notre Dame athletic director and football Coach Kevin Rooney was forced to walk an awkward line when his school’s administration made its no-Crespi decree.

“As the football coach, I am disappointed,” he said at the time. “We like to play local teams and it’s a rivalry. We compete well with Crespi. This is an administrative decision.”

This week, he is still walking that awkward line.

“I’m glad we have the opportunity to play them again,” he said. “It will be fun. But I don’t want to stir up any controversy over the decision to have the cooling-off period. And I haven’t talked to my players about the rivalry aspect of the game. There is no need. Everybody here knows about the Crespi-Notre Dame rivalry.

“I think we all understand that the rivalry needs to be kept in perspective. It’s a football game, and we want to make sure it’s just that and not anything more.”

At Crespi, there always has been the feeling that the Notre Dame-initiated lull was a case of blowing things out of proportion.

“I’m still not sure what Notre Dame wanted to accomplish with the two-year layoff,” Crespi Athletic Director Paul Muff said. “We felt that things really weren’t that bad. I felt the rivalry had reached a good point.

“Our coaching staff knows the Notre Dame coaching staff very well and we all have a tremendous amount of respect for Kevin Rooney, and we always felt we could work things out. In my 15 years here, I always felt the rivalry brought out the best in both teams, in all sports.”

Muff said the faculty at Crespi has reminded the students this week of the need for proper behavior at the football game. Just like the school administration does before every football game.

“We purposely did not want to single this game out as anything different,” Muff said. “There are many students here now who have never been to a Crespi-Notre Dame game. But it’s such a natural rivalry. The kids from the two schools know each other from grammar school and the faculty and alumni know each other so well.

“I’m glad to have the rivalry back. I’m just hoping that some semblance of the rivalry that we used to have comes back.”