ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi better not show up at the Big 12 Conference Tournament in Oklahoma City this weekend.

Big 12 coaches are fed up at the lack of NCAA Tournament respect their league is getting from Lundardi and other college basketball analysts.

“I’m really disappointed in the way people are perceiving our league,” Texas A&M coach Billy Gillispie said during Monday’s Big 12 Coaches Teleconference. “We’re talking about a team in our league that needs to win a game in our conference tournament and they already have 10 wins. Give me a break.”

That team Gillispie is talking about is Kansas State.

ESPN.com, CBSSportsline.com and SportsIllustrated.com do not project the Wildcats (21-10, 10-6) to be in the NCAA Tournament. Even Blair Kerkhoff, Big 12 writer for The Kansas City Star, had K-State out of the tournament.

The Wildcats are being held out of the NCAA’s largely because of their soft non-conference schedule. Kansas State’s non-conference schedule is ranked 225, and the Wildcats still struggled. K-State lost to California by 30, New Mexico by 24 and to Colorado State by 1. The Wildcats have made their NCAA tournament case in the conference. They won at Texas, a feat no other team can claim and finished fourth.

The fifth team that has a chance to make it – Kansas, Texas A&M and Texas are regarded as locks – is Texas Tech. The Red Raiders (20-11, 9-7) don’t have a sparkling record, but they defeated the Aggies twice and the Jayhawks once. ESPN.com, CBSSportsline.com and SportsIllustrated.com all have Tech in the dance.

But Big 12 coaches don’t think four teams is enough when the Atlantic Coast Conference has a chance to get nine teams. The Big East Conference is projected to have seven, the Pacific-10 Conference six and the Southeastern Conference five.

Arkansas, which is fourth in the Southeastern Conference West Division, illustrates the Big 12’s unfair treatment. The Razorbacks (18-12, 7-9) are in the tournament according to Sports Illustrated. This despite having a worse record than K-State and Tech and going 0-3 against the Big 12, including a 22-point loss to Missouri.

“No one plays better ball than us from one through 12,” Gillispie said. “I get tired of hearing about other leagues having seven or eight teams then they’re talking about us having a must-win in the first round.”

Coaches also said that the conference’s best teams were getting raw deals. Kansas is only now being considered a No. 1 seed after multiple losses by Florida and North Carolina. Texas A&M (25-5, 13-3) isn’t even in the discussion for a No. 1 even though the Aggies defeated Kansas at Allen Fieldhouse and played a tough non-conference schedule that included UCLA.

“I kind of wondered that when we have two teams that are No. 1 seeds,” Kansas State coach Bob Huggins said about the perceived lack of respect. “Kansas, they are a No. 1 seed. Whoever doesn’t think that I don’t know what they’ve been watching.”

The conference’s problems could be because not enough people are watching. Gillispie blamed a lack of marketing for why the Big 12 was getting slighted. He said the conference wasn’t doing enough to promote itself. Self also mentioned weak non-conference schedules and the Midwest location of Big 12 schools as problems. Self wasn’t as adamant as Gillispie about blaming the conference’s marketing, but he saw some areas that could have brought the Big 12 more publicity.

“Bobby Knight set the all-time wins record this year,” he said. “You’ve got Bob Huggins who has K-State rolling. You’ve got maybe the best college player since 1980. You’ve got maybe the best clutch player in recent memory and maybe as balanced a team as there’s been in recent memory. You’ve got so many things you can sell as a league. And now all of a sudden it’s ‘is our league that good?’”

Neither Self nor Gillispie had a perfect way to solve the conference’s problems. Self suggested that the coaches and conference leaders needed to devise a strategy together that might include scheduling tougher non-conference games. Both agreed that something needs to be done.

“I don’t know what the answer is, but I know some other leagues have it figured out,” Gillispie said. “I don’t know how much we’re following the plans they are using. There has to be a better solution than what we have.”

Kansan sportswriter Mark Dent can be contacted at mdent@kansan.com.

— Edited by James Pinick