The Lilywhites return to PR1 on Saturday and manager Simon Grayson is looking for another positive display against his former club.
The North End boss was in charge of the Terriers the last time they played at Deepdale, but will be looking for a home win this time out as his side look for another valuable three points.
Speaking ahead of the visit of the West Yorkshire side the manager felt that his side have plenty of motivation following their defeat at the John Smith’s Stadium on Boxing Day.
“They have been the same a lot of the season,” he said. “We suffered a disappointing result and performance on Boxing Day. It was a game that was played in blustery conditions and there wasn’t much in it in the first half, but in the second half they were much better than us and we didn’t perform.
“What we did do was react well to that performance and got results against Hull and Rotherham.
“They have got some attacking players; they try and press you quickly and try and push bodies forward, so we have to make sure that we defend properly, but try and exploit any areas of weakness that that they have got, because they do push bodies forward.
“Hopefully we can exploit that and play like we did in the second half against Brentford, where we created a lot of chances and forced their goalkeeper to make a lot of good saves. We need the same sort of energy and quality and sooner or later one or two of our players will score a few goals and it will be a convincing result for us.
“You have to earn the right in any game to go and get three points and we have to do that at the weekend.”
Looking back to the game in late December the gaffer admitted that the performance could have merited an even bigger loss, but feels that his side have learnt from that experience.
“The first half was very even and we had a couple of half decent chances. In the second half we lost our discipline and organisation and you do that against anybody in the Championship, then you are going to get punished.
“It was one of those games where we lost 3-1, but it could have been five or six had we not been careful and we had to learn from that game and since then we have responded and got some good results.
“It just shows that if you don’t do your jobs properly as an individual within the framework of the team, the team will suffer. That’s what happened that day and hopefully on Saturday we put right what went wrong there and everybody does their jobs right.”
It is exactly three years to the month since the PNE chief left Town and joined the Lilywhites, but this isn’t something he is dwelling on this weekend: “I’m not bitter or anything else about former clubs.
“You are disappointed at the time when you leave, but I have moved on and enjoyed my three years here.
“There is no extra motivation than there was against Derby or next week against Wolves, it is about doing what is right for this football club and keeping building week in and week out.”