How Tesoro got an at-large berth

First, Tesoro won a three-way coin flip with San Clemente and Trabuco Hills to be the South Coast League's No. 3 team (behind 1. Mission Viejo and 2. El Toro).

There were 11 applicants for the Pac-5 Division's two at-large berths. According to CIF-Southern Section assistant commissioner Glenn Martinez, in charge of the section's management of football, the five top candidates for the berths were Newbury Park (6-4) from the Marmonte League, Long Beach Jordan (5-5) from the Moore League, Bishop Amat (7-2-1) from the Serra League, Tesoro (7-3) from the South Coast League, and JSerra (6-4) from the Trinity League.

A points system is used to select teams from the pool. The system: Head-to-head competition of teams under consideration (four points); overall strength of the league from which the team is entered (one point); overall win-loss record (1 point); strength against common opponents (one point); and strength of schedule (two points, using overall win-loss record of opponents).

Tesoro had the most points of the group when compared invidually against the other four teams in the pool. Helping Tesoro's cause was the CIF-SS Football Coaches Advistory Committee's ranking of Pac-5 leagues, which went this way: 1. Trinity; 2. South Coast; 3. Marmonte; 4. Serra; and 5. Moore.

So, thanks to a coin flip, Tesoro is in the playoffs.