After being on the bubble of the NCAA tournament picture for so long, it seemed like a given that the UConn loss would bump SMU out of most projections. But ESPN's Joe Lunardi still pictures the Mustangs dancing.
Lunardi's latest bracketology pegs SMU in a play-in game, facing Syracuse in Dayton for the chance to play Creighton in San Diego.
A couple of other local schools could get a much more favorable destination for the first round. Lunardi projects Texas A&M to be an 11-seed against Miami in Dallas, with the winner of that contest facing the winner of three-seed Oklahoma and Belmont at the American Airlines Center.