Coming off its first setback of the season and falling out of the Class AA top-10 rankings, the Bowdon High School football team has spent the better part of the week regrouping from its homecoming loss to Manchester, putting the onus on bouncing back against Jordan.

The Red Devils play host to the Red Jackets in a 7:30 p.m. Region 5-AA contest on Friday night at Warren P. Sewell Field, and Bowdon coach Dwight Hochstetler said his team needs to not only get over the loss to the Blue Devils, but also clean up some issues from the 19-13 decision.

“It was a tough loss. I think we learned something from it. Basically, we’re working on Bowdon this week. We made a lot of mental mistakes last week and we’re trying to correct those. We’re trying to become a better football team this week,” Hochstetler said.

Jordan (0-5, 0-3 Region 5-AA) is much more known for its prowess on the hardwood during the winter months, as it continues to struggle on the gridiron under first-year coach Jim Brown this fall. The Red Jackets come to Bowdon (4-1, 2-1) in the midst of a 19-game losing streak, dating back to the 2010 season.

And while the Red Jackets have endured their fair share of troubles, Hochstetler said they have some athletes that can hurt you if they get out into space.

“They’ve got a lot of kids that can take it to the house if you’re not careful. We need to play real disciplined and control the line of scrimmage. If we do that, we feel like we’ll pretty much stop them,” said Hochstetler, who will make his second attempt to move into a tie for fourth place on the career wins list in Georgia with fellow coaching legend Luther Welsh at 323 victories on Friday.

And while personal kudos aren’t something the modest Red Devil head man likes to draw attention to, Hochstetler is very much invested in the Region 5-AA playoff race. The Bowdon coach said last week’s loss makes every game all the more magnified, as the Red Devils can ill-afford to fall back any further.

“Every game is big. You don’t know what’s going to happen at the end of the season. We’re sort of behind the 8-ball right now. We’ve got to take each game like it’s the game. So we feel like it’s a big ball game for us. We need to continue winning to increase our chances of having a good season,” Hochstetler said.

Along with suffering the loss on the scoreboard last week, Hochstetler said the physical confrontation left his ball club a little banged up.

“We’ve got a few that’s not practicing. But hopefully they’ll be ready by Friday night. Manchester was a physical ball game, and we’re feeling the affects from it,” Hochstetler said.