Some coaches play down talk of payback or redemption when facing a team they lost to the last time out.

Bonnie Henrickson is not one of those coaches.

The Kansas University women’s basketball coach remembers her team’s 63-48 loss to Indiana at Assembly Hall in Bloomington, Ind., last season, and she has been calling today’s rematch in Allen Fieldhouse (2 p.m., Sunflower Broadband channel 6) a “revenge game.”

“We didn’t show up to play and give ourselves a chance, and we were out of it pretty quick,” she said of the game last December.

That game was close in the opening minutes before IU went on an 18-5 run. KU closed the gap to one in the opening minutes of the second half, but the Hoosiers outscored the Jayhawks 25-15 in the final 11-plus minutes to get the victory.

That loss dropped last year’s Jayhawks to 5-5, but this year’s squad is a year older and playing much better, entering today with a 6-1 mark. IU, on the other hand, has since lost a few of its key contributors from last year’s victory, including Carrie Smith, who scored a game-high 13 points in Bloomington. The Hoosiers come to Lawrence today with a 4-4 record and are led by sophomore guard Jamie Braun (14.9 ppg).

The biggest difference for KU this time around against IU should be experience – the freshmen who played major minutes last year are now sophomores – and, Henrickson said, the Jayhawks are playing with a lot of confidence.

“(The Jayhawks) have a lot of confidence in each other. They really get excited about their teammates playing well, and good teams do that,” the coach said. “I don’t think they’re overconfident, though. They know we’ve got a big game with Indiana coming up.”

That confidence has been on display in KU’s last three home outings, which it has won by an average margin of 26.7 points.

Most recently, KU beat Marquette, 74-55, on Thursday when Danielle McCray, Sade Morris and Krysten Boogaard all set career scoring marks. However, Henrickson said she still worried about a few aspects of her team’s execution.

“We played well, but there’s some things we’ve got to clean up and get better at,” she said, pointing to the Jayhawks’ struggles against Marquette’s full-court press. Henrickson called their execution against the pressure “sloppy,” noting the bad spacing, passes and decisions.

Fortunately for the Jayhawks, their recent string of hot starts and ensuing big leads at home have made those issues less problematic.

“The way they start the games, they’re putting themselves in a position to be in it at the end of it,” Henrickson said.

And if they do that today, KU will be in a position to exact some revenge.