Gillispie wants Big 12 to lobby more for Tournament entries

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Gillispie wants Big 12 to lobby more for Tournament entries

Aggies coach says league falls short in marketing its postseason candidates

COLLEGE STATION — Texas A&M coach Billy Gillispie has voiced concerns that the Big 12 was not doing enough to secure conference teams more bids to the NCAA tournament.

"I'm really disappointed in the way that people are perceiving our league, and I think our league doesn't do as good a job as our competitors do as far as marketing our league because we're talking about a team in our league that needs to win a game in the conference tournament and they've already got 10 wins? Give me a break," Gillispie told reporters Monday.

Kansas State (21-10, 10-6), which finished fourth in the regular season, is still being mentioned as a bubble team for the NCAAs. Gillispie said that's frustrating, particularly when he hears that other conferences are looking at getting seven or more bids.

"Nobody plays better basketball than us one through 12. We just haven't done a good enough job, in my opinion, as a league," Gillispie said. "I think the members are taking care of the league better than the league is taking care of its members in this particular situation."

Other leagues do it better

Gillispie said he didn't know "what the answer is but I know that some other leagues have it figured out."

"I'm not one of those administrators or whatever, but I know the coaches and the players and the teams do a lot for the league," Gillispie said.

"I think that they have to figure out a way, maybe study other leagues and talk to other leagues and be more proactive instead of reactive because our teams are too good and our players are too good and our coaches have done a great job. ... Why are we settling for a certain number of teams in the tournament when everybody else is getting more?"

"I don't know what more the teams and the coaches and the players can do," he added. "We need to have more help."

Weiberg says exec works on TV

Commissioner Kevin Weiberg pointed out that the Big 12 has an associate commissioner dedicated to basketball and has worked to secure more national television appearances for the conference — including 35 on ESPN networks and eight on national broadcast networks.

He also commended the conference's media relations staff for providing "as much information, as good quality information, as anyone."

"On the side of just talking about the tournament, we avail ourselves of every opportunity to talk to our appointed NCAA men's basketball committee contacts, and I know from speaking directly to them that they believe the quality of information we've provided to them is very good," Weiberg said. "I think that the effort that we put into it is a pretty good one.

"I know that coaches get frustrated when they see stories being written from time to time about teams with winning conference records potentially being so-called bubble teams, and I understand that frustration and share it. But I do think that you have to, at some point, have to feel like the process is going to take care of some of that and you have to understand that we're all working really hard to do the best we can for the conference."

The Big 12 got six bids each year from 2000 to 2003 before dropping to four in 2004. Six Big 12 teams got in again in 2005 and four made the tournament last year.

"I think our conference is clearly among the top five or six conferences in the country," Weiberg said. "From my perspective, if you have a winning or even a .500 conference record in the Big 12 you should be receiving very serious consideration to being in the at-large field."