ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — The Buffalo Bills will have a team-record six prime-time games this season. Half of those will be on either Channel 2, and one of them will be part of a special broadcast on Peacock.
The first two Bills primetime games will be part of the regular Sunday Night Football lineup on Channel 2.
The first game comes in Week 6, when the Bills host the New York Giants at 8:20 p.m. on Oct. 15.
There will be a lot of Western New York connections in that game, and two of them go through St. Francis High School in Hamburg. Former Bills offensive coordinator Brian Daboll graduated in 1993 from St. Francis, as did Chris Smith, a 2005 graduate and former University at Buffalo graduate assistant. Giants general manager Joe Schoen spent time with the Bills from 2017 to 2021 as the assistant GM, and before the season, he traded for edge rusher Boogie Basham.
The second game comes in Week 9, when the Bills travel to Cincinnati for an 8:20 p.m. game on Nov. 5.
When these teams played back on Jan. 2, the game and the sports world stopped when Bills safety Damar Hamlin went into cardiac arrest. Medical professionals at the stadium were able to restore his heartbeat on the field before he was transferred to a local hospital. Hamlin has worked his back to the field ever since, and this season, he will return to that same field. Like last time, this game will be in prime time.
The Bills will have a third prime-time game on Channel 2, but this one will also be streamed on Peacock. The game is an 8 p.m. start on Saturday, Dec. 23 in Los Angeles against the Chargers.
Peacock will also be the host of the first-ever, streaming-only NFL playoff game; that wild card game will take place on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024.
"The Peacock exclusive wild card game and regular season game will be broadcast on NBC stations in the two competing team cities, and available on mobile devices with NFL+," the NFL said in a statement back in May.
