Toothbrush? Check.

Phone charger? Yep.

A warm beanie for the trip to the NCAA Tournament’s round of 16 in Kansas City, since winter is reluctant to leave the Midwest? Got it.

Defense? Well, the Texas men’s basketball team hasn’t unpacked that from the suitcase since it departed for the Big 12 Tournament two weeks ago, when it began a streak of five straight tournament wins that has propelled the team into the program's first Sweet 16 since 2008.

“Defense travels,” said interim head coach Rodney Terry, who has turned the phrase into a mantra for the second-seeded Longhorns. “Some nights we're not going to shoot as well as we want to shoot, but our defense has traveled for us.”

Terry said those words after the Longhorns held Penn State to 41.7% shooting, including 8-of-28 from 3-point range, in a 71-66 win in an NCAA second-round game Saturday But they could apply to any of the five games Texas (28-8) has played in the postseason — three Big 12 Tournament contests and two NCAA Tournament games. The Longhorns have allowed opponents to shoot a cumulative 38% in that stretch, including just 26% from 3-point range.

According to guard Jabari Rice, that defensive consistency comes from a workman-like approach preached by Terry and embraced by the players.

More:Bohls: Rodney Terry has delivered, now Texas should do the right thing and hire him

“It's just preparation,” Rice said. “Every single time we are in practice, we're locked in. Walk-throughs, we're locked in. We know a time and place when to play and when not to, and I think it's a sense of urgency and seriousness when it comes to playing these type of games (because) it's do or die.”

More points this season, but same defense

Texas isn’t as good a defensive team as last season, based on the stats. The Longhorns led the Big 12 in points allowed in the 2021-22 season with 60.6 points a game while ranking in the middle of the conference pack in defensive field-goal percentage.

But the eyes tell a different story. This year’s team gave up 67.2 points in conference play but played at a faster tempo; it led the Big 12 in scoring with 77.8 points per contest compared to 68.8 points scored a year ago. This season’s defensive shooting percentages were close to last year’s marks, even though the Big 12 was a better offensive conference this season compared to 2021-22.

More:As senior year winds down, Timmy Allen doing what it takes to advance in NCAA Tournament

The Longhorns are particularly effective on the perimeter, especially in the postseason. Rice and Tyrese Hunter joined the program this season from New Mexico State and Iowa State, respectively, and they’ve added a jolt of defensive intensity on the outside. In addition, point guard Marcus Carr remains an elite on-ball defender who has 11 steals in the postseason, and freshman Arterio Morris has shown flashes of defensive dominance while playing limited minutes off the bench.

When Rice, the Big 12’s sixth man of the year, subs into the game to form a three-guard lineup, the Longhorns can get particularly disruptive on the outside.

“I think me and Tyrese were brought in to be really good defenders and to lead the team on defense,” Rice said Tuesday at the Longhorns’ practice facility. “I think you have all of us that are willing to defend; if you have five guys on the floor that are willing to defend and two guys that are just defense dominant, that really helps.”

An athletic set of forwards also helps. Timmy Allen remains one of the best one-on-one wing defenders in the country, and Brock Cunningham, Dylan Disu and Dillon Mitchell all have the quick feet to close out on jump shooters and close up lanes into the paint.

The Longhorns played a lot of help-side defense early in the year but have gradually trusted their one-on-on defense more. Having versatile defenders who can adjust quickly allows the Longhorns to up their aggressiveness on the outside, Rice said.

“In the beginning of the year, we started with side defense, but I don't think we really push too much side defense right now,” he said. “We’re just trying to guard your yard and stay in front of a guy. And everybody else is being a second defender, being able to help if your teammate gets beat.”

Hunter says physical play on the perimeter matters just as much as in the paint.

More:Texas uses 3-point shooting to brush aside Colgate in first round of NCAA Tournament

“We try to keep from having mismatches, big on little or little on big,” Hunter said. “We try to blow up (screens) and just get through them.”

Xavier will test the Texas defense

The Texas defense will get tested yet again Friday against Xavier. The third-seeded Musketeers lead the nation is assists with almost 20 a game, and they collected 22 assists in an 84-73 win in the second round against Pittsburgh. They were the 11th-best scoring team in the nation, averaging 81.2 points a game, and sixth-best in field-goal percentage at 49.3%.

“They're high scoring and are really good at passing the ball, sharing the ball with each other,” Rice said. “They're really connected. They really shoot the ball really well, and they have a good pace.”

Hunter agreed, saying Xavier “is a very unselfish” team. But he also knows the Longhorns have limited high-powered offenses such as Kansas and Penn State well below their shooting and scoring averages during the postseason. The Longhorns may face their toughest defensive challenge of the tournament so far, but Hunter says Xavier will have to adapt, too.

“I don't think they’ve faced pressure like how we play defense,” he said. “So I think a lot of the things that they are comfortable with and being able to throw the ball wherever they want to, we can go out there and kind of speed them up and turn the ball over.”

Friday's game

NCAA Tournament Sweet 16: (2) Texas vs. (3) Xavier, 8:45 p.m., T-Mobile Center, Kansas City, Mo., CBS, 104.9

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Texas men bringing defense along for the ride in NCAA Tournament