JEFFERSONVILLE — Ever since a slow start cost Jeffersonville a shot at winning at Bedford North Lawrence a year ago, Red Devil players have been itching to get the Stars on the field again.

The Devils were hoping to draw Bedford in Class 5A, Sectional 8. It didn’t happen. Jeff fell to Floyd Central in the opening round and Bedford beat the Highlanders the following week en route to its first sectional title in school history.

So it’s been a long 367 days after last year’s regular-season 28-21 loss, which the Red Devils feel was precipitated by a few bad calls by the officials in Bedford.

“I think one of the pluses is our team wants this team. They want to play Bedford,” Jeff coach Lonnie Oldham said. “Since last year, they’ve been wanting to play Bedford. They’re high on the kids’ radar. Anytime the kids are talking about playing a team, as a coach, you don’t have to get them fired up. I think emotionally we’re going to be fired up.”

Throw on top of it that the Stars have beaten Jeff four straight times, including a couple of heartbreakers and one blowout, and Bedford’s sectional title in 2011, and Oldham expects his squad to take out its frustration on the Stars on Friday.

“They’re sectional champions and that helps, too. Plus they’ve beaten us [four] years in a row,” Oldham said. “We have some kids who have never beaten them. We’ve taken a few butt kickings from them, so that’s gotten our kids’ attention.”

Bedford coach Bret Szabo said that since he took over and turned around a losing program, the Stars are used to being the targets of opposing teams.

“I think for years everybody’s given us their best game,” he said. “I don’t think anybody likes losing to us because we’ve got a bunch of small-town kids who have had some success. These schools always beat up on Bedford. Now that we’ve turned the tables on them a little bit, it’s always a motivator for people.

“We’re always the hunters. Every win for a program like ours is a big win.”

This may be the right year to target Bedford. The Stars are 0-2 after back-to-back losses to the Bloomington schools. Bedford lost the majority of its talent from last year’s sectional championship team and may take awhile to reach peak production.

“They’re 0-2, but they’ve played two quality teams,” Oldham said. “I don’t look at them being like an 0-2 team that was 0-2 after playing teams in this area. They’re a quality team, they’re well-coached. They’re going to do some things that will present us some problems.”

“The last two years, we were a couple of plays away from being 0-2,” Szabo said. “It’s not like we’ve always been a juggernaut out of the gate. We’re making atypical mistakes for BNL right now. Hopefully, we’ve got a few of those fixed.”

Jeff, on the other hand, is coming off of an impressive 52-14 win over Seymour. In the win, the Red Devils jumped out to a 46-7 halftime lead, leaving Szabo awed by their skill.

“I’m very impressed,” Szabo admitted. “I think I saw five different kids score [in the first half] and they had five consecutive touchdown passes. [Tight end Dionte] Allen looks really, really good and I think Austin Hines is a terrific running back.

“They have a lot of good skill people and a big offensive line. They look like a very, very solid football team.”

So how good could Jeff be this season?

“I really don’t know,” Oldham said. “I think offensively we’ll pose problems to any team we play because of what we do and how we do it. Defensively, we vary our defense and can do some things there as well. I believe at the end of the year, we’re going to be way better than we were last year. But to say how good we are right now, I don’t know. We’re 1-1.”

One thing Oldham does know is that Friday’s game against Bedford will have a lot of impact on both teams’ seasons.

The winner likely vaults into position of top contender to Columbus East in the Hoosier Hills Conference and could ride a wave of momentum heading forward.

“This game’s huge. This game could be the difference between 8-1 or 7-2, or 7-2 and 6-3 [in the regular season],” Oldham said. “This game’s going to have a lot of swing in it, but it’s not the championship game. The [playoffs don’t] start until Week 10. We want to keep things in perspective. But we’re trying to do something that hasn’t been done around here in a while and that’s win a conference championship.”