A stunning loss to Kentucky in the SEC tournament final did not stop South Carolina from claiming the No. 1 overall seed in the NCAA women’s tournament bracket announced Sunday. Joining the Gamecocks as the team to beat in the NCAA men’s tournament bracket, per their respective selection committees, is Gonzaga.

The other top seeds in the men’s tournament are Arizona, Baylor and Kansas. Baylor’s inclusion in that group was the only development that was not completely expected, but while the defending champion Bears lost in the Big 12 tournament, they benefited from some other contenders also failing to win their conference crowns.

Similarly on the women’s side, defending champion Stanford and North Carolina State also got No. 1 seeds as expected, with Louisville’s ascension to that quartet ending the only mystery there. Baylor, which lost on Sunday to Texas in the Big 12 final, got the No. 2 seed in Louisville’s bracket. The selection committee also did N.C. State no favors by placing it in the Bridgeport Region — with Connecticut as the No. 2 seed.

The men’s selection committee clearly was impressed with the Big Ten, which got a tournament-high nine teams into the field of 68. Among those squads were a trio of programs — Indiana, Michigan and Rutgers — that were squarely on the bubble. The first four teams out were Dayton — which suffered from the fact that Atlantic 10 rival Richmond won their conference tournament on Sunday — Oklahoma, SMU and Texas A&M.

The head of the women’s tournament selection committee defended on Sunday the decision to place Connecticut close to home as the No. 2 seed in the Bridgeport Region. As ESPN’s Holly Rowe noted on the selection show broadcast, fans of North Carolina State, which was made the top seed in the region, had reason to possibly be “furious” about that development.

Nina King, the committee chairwoman who is also the athletic director at Duke, said that was simply the way “it fell this year.”

The selection committee placed each seed line on an S curve, King said, meaning that the final 1 seed would be matched up with the top 2 seed, and so on. After arranging the seed lines in that manner, King said that “when we placed them in their regionals, we tried to stay true to the S curve, to really ensure competitive equity.”

King also praised U-Conn., which got star guard Paige Bueckers back from injury toward the end of the season, as having “all the pieces, all of the team playing and also a team that’s on an upward trajectory.”

Iowa, which won the Big East tournament, also earned an “upward trajectory” description as King explained why the Hawkeyes moved up from the 4 seed line to a 2 seed when the bracket was revealed Sunday.

“We felt really comfortable rewarding them for their success of late,” King said of Iowa. “Something we talk about a lot is seeding is really based on how a team is playing now.”

King also indicated that Baylor’s loss Sunday in the Big 12 tournament final cost it any chance of overtaking Louisville, which won the ACC tournament earlier in the week, for a No. 1 seed.