Buffalo's bye week gave the team a chance to recharge and refocus ahead of their Week 8 matchup at the Carolina Panthers.

"You sit there and you try to disconnect and not think about (the losses), and allow your mind to kind of reset and be refreshed," QB Josh Allen said. "It's hard not to think about it, and it's hard not to want to get back in the building."

Allen said the team "got the ball rolling" with a light practice Monday, then had their normal two-hour practice Wednesday in pads. The Bills are 7-0 off a bye since Allen became the starter.

The last time the Bills and Panthers met was Dec. 19, 2021 when Buffalo defeated Carolina 31-14 at home. This was Allen's first and only time facing the Panthers. Buffalo holds a 6-2 record all-time over Carolina.

On Sunday, the Bills seek to snap their two-game losing streak while the Panthers hope to extend their win streak to four. During Buffalo's bye, Carolina defeated the New York Jets 13-6.

The Bills have not lost three straight games since 2018. In 2024, they bounced back from a two-game losing streak and went on to win the next seven games. Allen has also never lost three consecutive games in his career.

"You take it one day at a time, one week at a time, that's how the league is," head coach Sean McDermott said. "And you get too far ahead of yourself, or you look too much in the past, you lose focus on where you're at."

Clarity coming off the bye

Buffalo is ready to get rolling.

During the bye, McDermott said he slowed things down and had more time to assess different areas of the team whether positive or negative. He emphasized detail, discipline, and playing at a level he knows the Bills can.

"Here's what we're doing well. Here's who's doing it well … then it's into where do we need to adjust," McDermott said. "There's course corrections through every season. So those that can make those adjustments play better, perform better and you go from there."

To move forward, McDermott said he and his team need to focus on the present moment. No matter what their record is coming off a bye or what plays into their success to snap losing streaks, he wants to make sure his team wins day-by-day whether it's practice or game day.

Part of this process is slowly finding out what the team's identity is, and that doesn't happen overnight. McDermott said it unfolds one week at a time.

"I don't really know that we're there yet, and that's okay. But we got to keep pushing. We got to stay urgent with our approach, the discipline, the detail," McDermott said. "… It's really establishing who were trying to become as a football team. And you just take it one week at a time."

Added Allen, "We got a lot of work to do, but this is a team that has a lot of guys that want to do that work, that care for each other, and we're just excited for another opportunity this week."

Bills' defense gets a boost at the right time

The Panthers have a top three rush offense in the NFL, averaging 140.1 yards per game in 2025, behind Buffalo and Washington. They averaged 35.3 carries per game and 193.3 yards per game since Week 5, both leading the league.

Running back Rico Dowdle leads the league in carries (70), rush yards (468), and scrimmage yards (569) since Week 5.

"I think the ability to have two guys is certainly powerful and dangerous. There's very few in the league who have two," McDermott said of Dowdle and running back Chuba Hubbard. "I think overall they bring a lot to the table in terms of what they do at the line of scrimmage and the tackles they break. I mean, the numbers speak for themselves.

Going into Sunday, the defense has a little extra support coming in.

Defensive end Michael Hoecht, defensive tackle Larry Ogunjobi, and cornerback Maxwell Hairston all returned to practice. After missing six games each due to suspension, Hoecht and Ogunjobi were full participants in Wednesday's practice. Hairston (knee) was a limited participant in his first practice as the team opened up his 21-day ramp up window from injured reserve.

McDermott said he wants to assess where they are at as they adjust and determine their playing status closer to Sunday.

"At the end of the day, that's how you win football games, is you do what your defense is supposed to do each and every snap and [Ogunjobi] and I are just going to be another piece of that" Hoecht said. "We're not trying to come in and necessarily change too much. I think what we're trying to do is come in and be the 1/11^th that we're supposed to be."

Maxwell Hairston feels ready as he returns from injury

Especially for Hairston, he took his time on the sideline to understand the game from a different perspective.

"Getting super smart off the field, so when I do get back on there, physically I could be able to take what I've seen, take the mental reps I've taken and apply that to real life," Hairston said.

The cornerback said that his first practice back felt good and that he will do whatever the team needs him to. Whether that's playing or waiting another week, Hairston's just happy to be back with his teammates and will support them in any way he can, just as they did for him during his absence.

"When you got a team like this that is so together in a real-life brotherhood, they kept me involved. They supported me through the whole way and made me still feel like I was a part of the team even though I wasn't playing," Hairston said. "So honestly, they just made that whole rehab and whole thing just a lot easier for me."

While tapping back into the physical side of the game Hairston said is like riding a bike, the mental side is something he worked on throughout his recovery. He said he didn't allow his emotions to overcome him and put trust in the coaches and training staff to get him to where he needs to be.

Even one practice in, Hairston is treating every opportunity as if it's a game so he's ready for whenever he gets his chance.

"When I do get to the game it just feels like a practice with a crowd. And just staying positive, but really just having a mindset of don't let the guy to the left of me, the guy to the right of me down," he said.

Overcoming the offensive hump

The Bills started the season scoring 30-plus points in four consecutive games. That production halted against the Patriots and Falcons. McDermott and offensive coordinator Joe Brady said the level of urgency and execution needs to improve.

"We just haven't been there – or haven't been there consistently enough over the last three games in particular," McDermott said of detail and discipline.

Allen complimented the success that both the run and pass game had in the first six games, but believes the Bills can do a better job getting more receivers involved in the pass game. He also took accountability, saying that getting better as an offense starts with him.

"Just going out there and executing each and every given play call that [Brady] gives. But making sure that throughout the week we're straining in practice and finishing on plays. Sometimes it's the small things," Allen said. "You learn a lot from these losses that maybe you don't learn in wins."

Part of learning and moving forward for Allen is emphasizing camaraderie, sticking together and making sure everyone celebrates each success.

"We score, let's go celebrate, right? It's hard to score in this league. It's hard to win in this league," Allen said. "I feel like that again helps build the team too when you're taking an extra 15 seconds to our practice to go celebrate and pick somebody up and have a lineman spike the ball."

Allen believes the struggles the offense went through before the bye are fixable issues.

"I think it's very correctable," he said. "Just pulling together as a team, making sure we're staying as one unit, getting back to the fundamentals again, just trusting the other 10 guys on the field with you."