School: Clovis West High

He's qualified because: Bent on improving depth, he increased the size of his girls team by about 30%, placed in 12 of 16 events, scored 102 points and won the Central Section Grand Masters title by 45 points.

She said it: "Oh, gosh, he bugs everybody." — Golden Eagles triple gold medalist Alyssa Monteverde when asked if Palavicini recruits on campus.

Born, raised and educated through college in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Clovis West High track and field coach Martin Palavicini has a thick accent that can be difficult to follow.

And he didn't make it any easier to understand when he told his girls team prior to the Central Section Grand Masters Championships that he projected the Golden Eagles to edge Clovis 74-71 for the title.

Anyone with a clue about the sport in the section knew Clovis West was actually a prohibitive favorite going in.

"I wasn't serious," he says, "but only one or two came up and questioned me."

The ploy? "I wanted them to be sure each one of them counted, so everybody would score."

With Palavicini, it's all about depth, and he achieved his goal with rousing success when the Eagles placed in 12 of 16 events, including four golds, scored 103 points and ran away with their section-record seventh girls championship.

Bullard (57), Buchanan (52.5) and defending champion Clovis (50.5) rounded out the top four.

"That was the plan after we placed third last year," said Palavicini, The Bee's Girls Track and Field Coach of the Year. "I talked to coaches and our athletic director and essentially made a plan from that moment. And now looking back to the draw of that plan, 99% happened. That's why the big score."

Clovis West's girls team grew by about 25 to 67 this season, and it wasn't by accident.

Did Palavicini hustle up potential athletes on campus?

"Oh, gosh, he bugs everybody," said Bee All-Star Alyssa Monteverde, a three-year veteran who delivered 30 of the points with three gold medals in addition to running a leg on a second-place 400 relay team.

"Yes, that's the key and I will chase you down," says Palavicini, a former national-level steeplechaser in South America in his second year as the Eagles' head coach after assisting for six. "They're like, ‘Who's this guy with the accent talking to me, I've never seen him before.'

"I sell that they can be part of something unique, to use their talents, to have fun, travel and meet a lot of people. There's more outside of the oval than running or throwing."

Yet it was within and around that oval that Clovis West experienced its greatest joy with a balance of speed, hurdling, jumping and throwing while scoring everywhere except the 100, 800, 3,200 and triple jump.

"The year before we didn't win because of lack of depth," Palavicini says. "So changes needed to be made, and the plan worked."