FAYETTEVILLE — The University of Arkansas men’s basketball team might finally be building some momentum in the SEC.

“I think we played our two best conference games the last 80 minutes of basketball,” Coach Eric Musselman said on the Razorback Sports Network on Wednesday after a 91-84 win at Missouri. “I don’t think there is any doubt.

“We looked connected. We looked like a team that has an offensive rhythm, a team that has a defensive rhythm.”

The Razorbacks got their first road victory after playing No. 10 Kentucky tough in a 63-57 loss to the Wildcats last Saturday at Walton Arena.

Today, Arkansas (11-10, 2-6) will try to make it 120 consecutive minutes of good basketball in the SEC when the Razorbacks play LSU (11-9, 3-4) at the Maravich Assembly Center in Baton Rouge.

“I think you really have to re-evaluate how you scout their team and just focus in on the last 80 minutes that they’ve played,” LSU Coach Matt McMahon said at his Thursday news conference. “I thought they were terrific defensively against Kentucky. And then they really played a complete game on the road at Missouri.”

The Razorbacks led Missouri by 23 points in the second half after being ahead 47-28 at halftime.

“They absolutely dominated the game,” McMahon said. “So a great challenge, but a great opportunity for us.”

Arkansas senior Makhi Mitchell, who had 19 points and 14 rebounds at Missouri, said it’s not too late to turn the season around.

“I know it’s been a rough start to SEC play, but Coach Muss is keeping us motivated,” Mitchell said in an SEC Network interview. “He still believes in us.

“It’s not over yet, man. We’re going to continue to fight each and every game and play our hearts out. Just don’t give up on us.”

After the Kentucky game, Arkansas forward Chandler Lawson said he was encouraged by the fight the Razorbacks showed, especially coming off a 77-51 loss at Ole Miss.

“Of course we can build on this,” Lawson said. “I know we don’t want to celebrate no moral victories, and I feel like we should’ve won.

“But we won in the rebounding and the hustle. That’s the area we’ve looked lost at, I feel like. We’re getting our chemistry back and I feel like gaining our trust with each other.”

Musselman has re-invented the Razorbacks by focusing on inside scoring, with an added emphasis on rebounding and playing at a slower pace to control the tempo.

Arkansas outrebounded Kentucky 44-39 and Missouri 35-26 and outscored the Wildcats 30-28 and the Tigers 56-30 on points in the lane.

Mitchell, Lawson and senior Jalen Graham have rotated at the two inside spots and excelled with sophomore forward Trevon Brazile sitting out the past two games with knee soreness.

“Rotations were comfortable for many of the guys,” Musselman said after the Missouri game on RSN.

“Paint points was the theme of the day.”

Mitchell had 12 points and 13 rebounds against Kentucky before adding another double-double at Missouri.

“Mitchell is playing high-level basketball,” McMahon said. “Just playing with a lot of physicality up front.”

Musselman shortened his rotation to primarily eight players — his preferred number that has worked well in previous seasons — against Kentucky and Missouri.

One difference in the games was that senior guard El Ellis didn’t play at Missouri after starting and playing 32 minutes against Kentucky.

After Ellis had five turnovers against the Wildcats, Musselman started freshman Layden Blocker at point guard at Missouri and also played sophomore Keyon Menifield extensively.

Blocker played 29 minutes and had 9 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and 3 turnovers. Menifield played 32 minutes off the bench and had 16 points, 3 rebounds and 2 assists with 1 turnover after not playing against Kentucky.

“I thought those two guys played extremely well off each other,” Musselman said. “I thought they both were extremely unselfish.

“I think our quickness with Keyon and Layden, it helped us keep the ball in front. … Defensively they were really good. It created a little more defensive havoc for the opposition.”

The Razorbacks’ 10 steals — led by Graham’s career-high four — were their most in an SEC game and matched their season-high. They also had 10 steals against Alcorn State and Oklahoma.

“Really, really happy with the defensive activity,” Musselman said.

LSU already has more SEC victories than all of last season, when the Tigers were 2-16, but they’ve lost three in a row to Texas A&M 73-69 at home and on the road to Georgia 68-66 and No. 24 Alabama 109-88.

Jordan Wright, a 6-6 senior guard who transferred from Vanderbilt, is averaging 15.6 points, 5-2 rebounds, 2.7 assists and 2.1 steals per game to lead the Tigers. He scored 33 points against Texas and in SEC play is averaging 17.6 points.

When Vanderbilt beat Arkansas 97-84 last season, Wright had 17 points in 24 minutes.

Senior point guard Jalen Cook is back at LSU for a second time and averaging 15.1 points. He played at LSU as a freshman, then transferred to Tulane where he started the past two seasons before returning to the Tigers.

Cook became eligible on Dec. 16 and has played in 10 games. He scored 28 points against Vanderbilt and 21 at Georgia.

Will Bates, a 6-11 senior transfer from Nevada, is averaging 11.5 points and 5.2 rebounds.

“I think there’s been massive improvement from where we were obviously a year ago,” said McMahon, who led LSU to a 14-19 record in his first season after arriving from Murray State. “But even from early December this year.

“The disappointing piece in that is we got off to a great start at 3-1 [in SEC play] and put ourselves in position to be in two one-possession games and we weren’t able to get over the hump in those.

“So I think the next phase is you have to take a step forward and understand the value of every possession so we can win those games that we’re in.”

The Tigers, who are 8-3 at the Maravich Assembly Center this season, didn’t play a mid-week game as part of the SEC scheduling a bye for each team, so they’ve had extra time to get ready for Arkansas.

“They’ve done a great job,” Musselman said Monday night on his radio show. “They play really well-connected on both sides of the floor, and they’ve been playing good basketball at home.”