Every game on the schedule is important, but with the way the season has gone so far, these next four games are so huge for this Razorback basketball program on so many levels. They are so important that the outcome of these games could even trickle over to the football program.

Under new head coach Eric Musselman, Arkansas has won four straight games and is coming off a 69-59 win over Texas A&M Saturday night in front of a sellout crowd in Bud Walton Arena (19,200 cap.) to improve to 12-1 and 1-0 in SEC play. It wasn’t the best performance the Hogs have had this season, far from it, but in what has become standard practice, they were clutch down the stretch.

The most impressive thing about Saturday night was the crowd. Razorback fans have been waiting for a reason to sellout Bud Walton, which was regular practice for the venue in the glory years of the 1990s. That is probably the best crowd Arkansas has had for a game since welcoming Georgia on March 1, 2009, before 19,724 in attendance (back then the attendance was estimated).

It has been over a decade since Hog ball got off to this kind of start, back when they opened 12-1 that same season in 2008-09 under former head coach John Pelphrey...before a complete and utter collapse of the program. This was a team that beat No. 4 Oklahoma 96-88 in front of 19,604 in attendance and then beat No. 7 Texas a week later in front of 19,012.

Four days later, it was like a different team was on the floor. A crowd of 18,884 showed up to watch the first loss, a 70-56 defeat at the hands of Mississippi State (more on that football recruiting impact later). Then after back-to-back-road losses, 18,246 came to watch the Hogs lose to Auburn, 73-51. The number dipped to 17,083, but the Hogs pulled out an 89-80 win over Alabama after that. But that win did not turn the tide as the Razorbacks would lose 11 of their final 13 games. Has a team ever fallen so quickly? -A 12-1 start ending in a 2-15 finish for a 14-16 final record, 2-14 in SEC play.

The Razorbacks have a lot of momentum going right now, and they are winning when not playing well and have even done it with a five guard lineup (See the final 12:12 of the win over Texas A&M Saturday night). If they can keep it going for these next two road trips, Wednesday, Jan. 8 at 8 p.m. in Baton Rouge against LSU (9-4, 1-0 SEC) and Saturday, Jan. 11 at 5 p.m. in Oxford against Ole Miss (9-4, 0-0 SEC), along with a home game on Wednesday, Jan. 15 against Vanderbilt (8-5, 0-0 SECC) at 7:30 p.m., it could push the best environment for a Razorback home game since the championship era a quarter century ago when the No. 17 ranked Kentucky Wildcats (10-3, 1-0 SEC) come to town on Saturday, Jan. 18, for a 3 p.m. tip.

That is also a major football recruiting weekend under new head coach Sam Pittman, as the Razorbacks are expected to host official visitors in the double-digits starting that Friday. There aren’t many times where big-time home basketball games sync up like that for football recruits, so it is important to take advantage when they do work out.

Again, throwing it back to that 2008-09 basketball season...Arkansas was 12-1 hosting Mississippi State in Bud Walton Arena in front of 18,884 in attendance with big-time recruits on hand like 5-star cornerback Darius Winston, 4-star running back Ronnie Wingo Jr., 4-star defensive tackle DeQuinta Jones, 4-star defensive back Rudell Crim, wide receiver Cobi Hamilton, offensive lineman Alvin Bailey, quarterback Brandon Mitchell and defensive back Ross Rasner. The Hogs lost that game 70-56 to start the 2-15 skid, but the crowd environment was a big selling point to those recruits. That class ended up being ranked 20th in the country on the 247Sports Composite.

It all starts Wednesday night at LSU.