North Carolina, DePaul, Georgetown and Kentucky were named the top seeds in each region in the NCAA basketball tournament pairings announced yesterday.

The top-ranked Tar Heels, who have lost twice in 29 games, will meet the winner of the first-round game between Temple and St. John's in the East Regional.

Georgetown, moved out of the East by the selection committee to the West, takes on the winner of the first-round game between Miami of Ohio and Southern Methodist.

DePaul is the top seed in the Midwest region and Kentucky in the Mideast.

Kentucky will meet the winner of the Alabama-Birmingham-Brigham Young game in the Mideast, and DePaul, hoping to give retiring Conch Ray Meyer his first nation championship, will go against the winner of Alabama and Illinois State in the Midwest.

Among the teams conspicuously absent from this year's 53-team extravaganza are Bucknell, 24-5, Tennessee Chattanooga, 23-6, and onetime collegiate powerhouse UCLA.

It will be the first NCAA tournament UCLA has missed since 1962, not counting two years ago when the Bruins were on probation.

The tournament, the biggest and richest in collegiate history, begins Tuesday with the champions of the 10 weakest Division I conferences meeting in a "preliminary round" in Philadelphia and Dayton. Those five winners will advance to first-round action around the country, beginning Thursday and running through the weekend.