The 31-year-old Rumford fighter has tried to keep his enormous respect for the brand name and its impact on the sport of mixed martial arts separate from his earnest conviction that he fights for the guy in the mirror, and him only.

First, the giddy, childlike enthusiasm.

“UFC has always been my big goal, but now with Bellator, it’s the same in my eyes,” Peterson said. “They’re the new breed of MMA. It means so much to me to have a chance to fight for their organization.”

Then, the single-minded determination that has made Peterson a New England middleweight champion and escalated his bouts into must-sees.

“I fight for different reasons than a majority of fighters do. This is the first time there might be some big guys watching. It’s cool and everything. But that’s not what makes me want to go in there, and I am 100 percent sincere when I say that,” he said. “I have a task at hand. I’d approach it the same way if it were in front of all those people and all my family and friends or if it were in a dark gym with 20 people watching.”

Peterson (7-3, 1 no-contest) will confront Dave Vitkay (11-12) of Atlanta at 185 pounds in what is essentially the main event of the undercard leading up to Spike TV’s 10 p.m. broadcast.

The first seven bouts will be streamed at Spike.com starting at 7:30 p.m.

After stepping 20 pounds above his customary weight class and losing by second-round stoppage to Greg Rebello on the most recent Colisee card in February, Peterson is acutely aware of what another high-profile loss could do to his career aspirations.

“You have to watch out for those guys with the .500 records, because guys like that are dangerous,” Peterson said. “You don’t want to lose to them. I’ve got a pretty good record going. But at the same time they’re a threat. I’ve got a lot of motivation for this fight.”

From watching Vitkay’s fights on the web, Peterson sees a mirror image of himself — someone who prefers wrestling and grappling to standing up and turning the fight into a slugfest.

He said the pairing is “tailor-made,” demanding the skills he perfected as a wrestling state champion at Mountain Valley High School and at the University of Southern Maine.

Peterson’s USM memories have come flooding back to him in preparation for this fight. His coach with the Huskies, Mike Brown, a Bonny Eagle graduate, is one of the few Mainers that have taken MMA to the highest level. Brown was a featherweight champion in World Extreme Cagefighting and now is under contract with UFC.

“I always had a high standard for myself and compared myself to him. He was my role model. Even before the Bellator thing came about, I had a high standard for myself,” Peterson said. “I have so much respect for what Bellator has accomplished. It’s almost like an American League and National League kind of thing at this point. You have this one organization in UFC that has been a monopoly pretty much. They literally bought out every other organization that stepped up to try and compete with them. Bellator is the only one that’s had enough money to battle back. Some of the best athletes in the world are representing them. This is such an honor.”

Bellator brought another Maine MMA legend, Marcus Davis of Houlton, on board for the televised portion of Thursday’s program. Peterson sees other Maine pros on the bill, many of them in place to beef up traffic at the turnstiles.

Peterson rightfully doesn’t want to be considered part of that group.

“This is my 12th pro fight. I’ve fought the best guys in New England. I’ve been ranked the No. 6 middleweight in the Northeast,” he said. “I’m not fighting on the card just because I have a following. I’ve earned it and there’s not a goddamned thing anyone can say that can take that away from me. I’ve put in the blood, the sweat, the tears, the beatings. I don’t do this to be popular.”

If Peterson has required any extra inspiration in recent weeks, it has come from another of his heroes, older brother Matt.

Matt Peterson, a state representative and co-founder of New England Fights, has been hospitalized.

“I’ve been wrestling since I was a little kid, in second grade. Throughout life, all the trials and tribulations, I’ve always had something motivating me or something significant that was going on,” Jesse Peterson said. “My brother being in a horrible accident and not able to be here to watch this, that’s a motivation.”

And being linked to one of the biggest names in the business? OK, that doesn’t hurt, either.

“This has been my dream ever since I started in this sport,” Peterson said of the brush with Bellator fame. “People who know me for my fights now might not realize I had my first pro fight before MMA was really even heard of.”

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